Politicians are trying to manufacture BVAS, hack into our servers – INEC

The Head of Department, Voter Education and Publicity of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Achumie Rex, on Wednesday, alleged that some politicians were making desperate efforts to manufacture the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) machine and hack into the commission’s server ahead of the 2023 general election.

This was as he reiterated the electoral umpire’s resolve to make the 2023 general election free and fair, adding that there would be simultaneous accreditation and voting on election days.

Rex stated this at a two-day workshop for civil society organisations on Voter Education, organised by the Transition Monitoring Group and supported by the USAID.

He said, “There is no room to hack into INEC server,” adding that “politicians are doing everything possible to get into the INEC server or even to manufacture BVAS, but unfortunately for them, INEC is three steps ahead of their plots.”

Allaying fears of network problem that would make BVAS work effectively at the rural areas, he said that BVAS was built on dual basis — “online and offline”.

Delivering his paper, Rex said, “At the moment, Nigerians are gradually bidding farewell to the dark days when the voter register was infested with foreign names and those days when election results were announced while voting was still ongoing. […]the 22 innovations introduced by the electoral management body, including the IReV and BVAS, have enabled the country move light years away from its electoral debacle.“