According to Vanguard newspaper, The test run of the Card Reader Machines proposed for the forthcoming general elections, carried out in 12 states, yesterday, exposed the flaws in the new voting technology introduced by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
Significantly, the machines failed to recognise Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) in some states. In many other states, the machines’ batteries went down after barely three hours of operation. The batteries running down within the space of time may be an issue in an election in which voting may span at least six hours.
The failure of the biometric confirmation of potential voters was higher in the North. Lagos State was, however, an exception as the exercise passed off smoothly with little hitches in the swiping of the PVCs and the biometric confirmation of the potential voters.
The exercise was carried out in Lagos, Ekiti, Anambra, Ebonyi, Taraba, Bauchi and Kano. The other states where the mock accreditation exercise took place were Kebbi, Delta and Rivers States. (Vanguard).