It was observed at different polling units that politicians induced voters to vote for their respective parties.
ALPHA NEWS NG gathered that political parties already devised new strategies of inducing voters to avoid the prying eyes of security and anti-graft agents.
A coalition of over 80 civil society organisations, under the aegis of Nigerian Civil Society Situation Room, lamented the level of vote-buying by party agents.
It however commended the high turnout of voters, peaceful conduct of the exercise, adequate presence of security agents and efficiency of the BVAS machines.
The NCCSR in its second preliminary statement, signed by its co-conveners, Ene Obi, Asma’u Joda and James Ugochukwu, partly read, “There was open negotiation of buying and selling of votes, well-coordinated by the polling agents in many of the polling units. There were no complaints from any of them against one another.
“Codes and coupons were used to extract commitments from voters as opposed to the blatant way money exchanged hands in the Ekiti State governorship election. INEC’s deployment of materials and personnel should also be commended. Vote trading was recorded in most of the areas observed particularly outside Osogbo.”
It also pointed out that knowledge of voting procedures and civic education of voters was very poor while voting cubicles in many of the polling units were not positioned to ensure secrecy of the ballots making it possible for voters to show their votes to other people.
A civil society organisation and election observer group, Yiaga Africa, also condemned voter inducement in the election.
Yiaga Africa’s Executive Director, Samson Itodo, recommended that the security agencies should “impose appropriate sanctions for any form of violation of the Electoral Act on Election Day, especially any threat to the right to vote or attempts to buy votes”.
In a statement by the group, Itodo said, “Yiaga Africa received reports of acts of vote-buying perpetrated by agents of the APC and PDP in some polling units.
“Yiaga Africa observed voters showing how they mark their ballot papers to APC party agents before dropping them in the ballot box. Also, thugs associated with the APC threatened to stab any voter who did not vote for the APC.”
He however advised “INEC to continue to uphold the secrecy of the ballot by ensuring voting cubicles and ballot boxes are situated to guarantee the secrecy of the ballot.”