INEC Plans Voting Centres For Two Million IDPs
Ahead of the 2023 elections, the Independent National Electoral Commission is planning to set up voting centres for over two million Internally Displaced Persons across the country.
The voting centres will be sighted in IDP camps.
Findings from the Federal Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development indicate that many of the IDPs are living in Borno, Zamfara, Benue, Nasarawa and 23 other states.
The IDPs were displaced from their communities and ancestral lands by Boko Haram insurgents, armed herdsmen and bandits, natural disasters and other emergencies.
The Chairman, Board of Survey and Technical Committee on Equipment Acquisition, INEC, Mohammed Haruna, said that the commission was working on setting up voting centres for the displaced persons to ensure that no one was disenfranchised in 2023.
Haruna explained that with the spread of insecurity across the country, INEC would conduct elections in IDP camps where they still exist, but would adopt a different approach for the internally displaced persons living in communities.
Although the INEC official did not give the number of IDPs that will be affected, there are indications that about two million IDPs in camps and communities may fall into this category.
He stated, ‘The issue of people voting in IDP camps is complicated. When insecurity was essentially restricted to the North-East ahead of the last general elections in 2019, it was easy to create IDPs camps. This time, however, many of the camps in the North-East and the few elsewhere have closed and most of the displaced persons are dispersed inside communities away from where they registered.
‘’Besides, insecurity has now spread nationwide. We will conduct elections in IDP camps where they still exist. But for the internally displaced persons living in communities, we need a different approach. We will do our best to see that no one is disenfranchised.’’
