The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC)  is to convert 1,109 voting points to polling units in Yobe.

Ahmed Makama, the state’s Resident Electoral Commissioner, disclosed this on Friday while addressing reporters during a stakeholders’ meeting on ‘Expansion of Voter Access to Polling Units’ in Damaturu.

“In Yobe, the delineation details comprises 17 Local Government areas, 178 Registration Areas, 1,714 stands alone Polling Units and 1,109 Voting Points which were used in the 2019 general elections.

“Therefore, in order to decongest the Polling Units for more access to voters, these voting points were proposed for their conversion to polling units.”, he said.

Like other states in the North-East, Yobe is one of the hotbeds of insurgency war being mounted by Boko Haram and other deadly splinter groups.

In April, Boko Haram overran Geidam, a large town in northern Yobe, occupying large swathes of land for days and distributing propaganda materials to conscript trapped residents into the organisation.

The Governor Mai Mala Buni administration had earlier in March shut down schools in fear of attacks as gunmen embarked on mass abductions of schoolchildren. Large spaces of the state remain ungoverned.

But Mr Makama said he hoped the commission’s hierarchy approves the conversion of those voting points into polling units, so that Yobe people will have better voting access with 2,823 polling units.

“This lingering crisis occurs because the existing polling units can no longer substantially guarantee the voter to exercise his/her fundamental right,” he said.