Voters complain of delay in Niger-- Card reader

                  Eligible voters in Niger State on Saturday complained of the delay encountered with the card reader machine and expressed fears that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) may not meet up with the time allocated for accreditation of voters during election.
                   This was the view of some voters during the card reader testing held in Gwada, Shiroro Local Government area of Niger state.
                   Despite the large turn out, most of voters could not participate in the exercise for having their permanent voters card (PVC).
               
All Progressives Congress (APC)‎ in the state commended the electoral body for usage of the reader card, stressing the mechanism may be free from abuse.
The party’s Public Secretary, Jonathan Vatsa who observed the mock voting said INEC did a fantastic job adding that it would knock out the issue of multiple voting.
“The card reader is very innovative, we commend the Chairman of INEC, he has done a fantastic job. The card reader is very innovative, it will knock out the issue of multiple voting.
“APC is in support of the card reader, it shows that we are moving away from the old age to the new age and that we are moving forward as a nation.”
Also reacting, the Chairman of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Hon. Umar Musa Ma’ali commended the testing of the card reader and said the PDP is satisfied with the card reader but was skeptical on the time frame of the accreditation.
“It takes more time to accredit one voter. The time allocated will not meet up with the accreditation of the voters. PDP‎ is satisfied with the card reader, we only have questions on the time frame. The time allocated is five hours and it takes one minute to accredit a voter, if there are 1000 voters in polling unit, it means it would take up to 14 hours to accredit them. Something needs to be done about this.”