By Gift Olivia Samuel, The Sight News
ABUJA: Civil society organization, Connected Development (CODE), has officially unveiled its situation room ahead of the 2023 general election slated for Saturday, February 25, 2023.
CODE, will be deploying its electoral intelligence tool, Uzabe to share live situation reports from all polling units across the country to ensure a credible and transparent election.
The organization’s Chief Executive, Hamzat Lawal, while speaking at the unveiling of the situation room located at the Abuja Continental Hotel, explained that they have been able to create a network of 20,000 community-driven observers, 7000 of which are accredited by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to give on-the-ground real-time report from the Local Government Area and polling unit.
He noted that Uzabe puts powers in the hands of the citizens, adding that for democracy to be successful, citizens must become informed about issues that can improve their lives.
According to him, “With Uzabe, citizens have access to real-time situation reports and analysis on electoral processes across the polling units and this is powered by 20,000 election observers who have volunteered their time and efforts in informing what becomes the outcome of the 2023 general election in the 36 States and the FCT. This qualifies Uzabe as a citizen-led movement”.
He stated that in a truly democratic system, the voters are the kings and are responsible for the creation of government, adding also that the citizens’ duty goes beyond casting their ballot, but ensuring that they stick together, united in their values as they pick leaders who reflect their values.
He further explained that CODE is taking the observation process critically and will be guided by INEC’s guidelines around election as well as the 2022 Electoral Act.
While noting that CODE is assured of the capacity of the security agencies to safeguard Nigerians as they cast their ballot, despite the security challenges, Lawal announced that they have also partnered with security agencies to ensure that issues around violence that would be reported by their observers will be escalated and appropriate actions taken.
He urged Nigerians to remain peaceful, go out and cast their ballot knowing that their votes will count, adding also that one vote can make a difference.
Earlier, CODE’s Director of Democracy and Governance, Emmanuel Njoku stated that the observers will be sending in both structured and unstructured reports using Uzabe.
Speaking further, he said, “Our platform has two lens, one is the structured report which would focus on the election procedures while the second will focus on unstructured report such as incidents and security reports which we will be publishing on Uzabe”, he said.
The incidence categorization on Uzabe, is expected to cover areas such as security issues, fake news, positive event, collation centre, ballot issues as well as voter inducement.
