By Ayodele Abere
YIAGA Africa has announced plans to deploy 250 stationary observers across 250 sampled polling units in Ekiti State for the upcoming governorship election as part of its Watching The Vote initiative.
The disclosure was made on Wednesday during a Civil Society and Media Roundtable organised by YIAGA Africa in Ado-Ekiti.
The event brought together Media practitioners and civil society groups to strategize on election observation and intervention ahead of the poll.
Speaking at the roundtable, Safiya Bichi, Head of Knowledge Management and Learning at YIAGA Africa, said the organisation’s objective was to create a platform for strategic dialogue, collaboration, and information sharing among stakeholders.
According to Bichi, YIAGA Africa will deploy stationary observers to the 250 sampled polling units across the 16 local government areas of the state. The organisation will also observe collation processes at both local government and state levels, and deploy roving observers in all 16 LGAs on election day.
“We will be observing the deployment of sensitive materials by INEC to RAC centres. We will observe all election day processes from opening of polls to closing, including coalition and result management,” she said.
Bichi added that YIAGA Africa will also monitor the upload of results to the INEC Result Viewing Portal, IReV, using its election result dashboard verification system.
On recommendations to stakeholders, she urged INEC to be professional and address logistics challenges, while ensuring proper implementation of the Electoral Act 2026 and INEC guidelines.
She called on security agencies to remain professional and non-partisan, and to guarantee the safety of voters, party agents, observers, and journalists.
Bichi equally advised the political parties to shun violence and discourage their supporters from engaging in acts that could disrupt the election.
“Election is not a do-or-die affair. Voters should turn out en masse. Not voting is also voting. If votes don’t count, nobody will be buying votes,” she said.
Also speaking at the event, Ekiti State Chairman of the Nigeria Union of Journalists, NUJ, Comrade Kayode Babatuyi, commended YIAGA Africa for the pre-election engagement. He urged media practitioners to use their platforms to promote a credible election.
Babatuyi said the NUJ has set up a special task force to tackle quack journalists and fake news in the state. He disclosed that in addition to INEC’s online accreditation, a physical accreditation will be conducted at the NUJ Secretariat for three days to verify journalists ahead of the election. Only bona fide members will be issued accreditation kits.
“We are creating awareness for the public. Don’t believe everything you see on the social media. If you don’t see it on conventional or traditional media, doubt it,” he added.
