The Independent National Electoral Commission said two million registered voters are expected to vote in Kogi’s Saturday off-cycle governorship election.

The election will be held in 3,508 polling units across the 21 LGAs, including Adavi, Ajaokuta, Ankpa, Bassa, Dekina, Ibaji, Idah, Igalamela/Odolu, Ijumu, Kabba-Bunu, Kogi, Lokoja, Mopamuro, Ofu, Ogori-Magongo, Okene, Okehi, Olamaboro, Omala, Yagba-East, and Yagba-West.

Speaking on preparations for the election, Gabriel Longpet, INEC’s resident electoral commissioner, said the electoral body was 100 per cent ready.

Mr Longpet disclosed that the commission recruited over 15,000 ad hoc staff to help in the smooth conduct of the poll.

The INEC official said, “We have 3,508 polling units and each of these units will be manned by four ad hoc staff aside from the security personnel that will be around to ensure peaceful conduct of the election. We shall deploy more staff and BVAS in densely populated polling units to complement those we are going to use.

“To be precise, we are going to use more than 900 backup BVAS. This is because some polling units have more than 1,000 to 2,000 registered voters, and we have to split the number by creating more voting points for easy voting. This becomes imperative as we don’t want to give room for anything that will delay the process.”

Mr Longpet added, “As soon as there is a report of any BVAS failure or challenge, we shall provide another one and configure it to that polling unit for smooth continuation of voting.”

The INEC official also mentioned that the BVAS were deployed to the 21 local government areas of the state in readiness for the election.

(NAN)