 As our number of elections continue today, candidates are hopeful as exercise comes to a close. And Judge claims two Nigerian banks should be indicted in main-ass pensions fraud. This is Post-Politics, I am Mary Anacorn. The all-progressive Congress and the People's Democratic Party have expressed optimism about the up-turning of the expected victory of the candidates of the all-progressive Grand Alliance, Professor Chukomah Soludo, in the Anambra State Governorate polls held on Saturday. Now the two parties said if certain anomalies in the polls were corrected, they would emerge victorious in the end. Well, joining us to discuss this are legal practitioners Mekanwadioke and Program Officer Yaga Afrika Gabriel-Prince. Thank you very much gentlemen for joining us. Thank you very much. Great. I'm going to start with you Mr. Mekanwadioke because you are obviously in the thick of everything and you have obviously watched the elections continuously unfold and unravel. So far so good. The elections were smooth in different parts of Anambra State but of course in Hiala it did not necessarily hold because of issues such as insecurity and violence and we could see what happened today. It took a while for the elections to start but then it has come to an end and we're waiting for 9 p.m. for coalition. But let's take a wider look at the elections in Anambra State even before Saturday. Okay, thank you so much. It's just like you said, I've been in Anambra at least like my 4th week running. So I've actually worked the elections and the preparation of the looks. I can assure you that the run up to the election was quite a feisty one especially because of the issue of insecurity. So in this situation we are because of the threats and the threat of lockdown. Especially the one that was to commence on the eve of the election. There was a lot of anxiety and in fact I was running the streets of, you know, on the eve of the election and you can't even see a soul on the streets. So there was that anticipation that probably people will not turn up for the election. But I guess the deal that was broke out with iPops, you know, helped greatly to push things to the positive side and we must really at this point give credit to Enzo Komuna, you know, which facilitated that deal that was broke out by the traditional rulers and the council of bishops and ad bishops. That's why even when I saw the statement saying that the governors were the ones that broke out the deal, I almost laughed because that's definitely far from the truth because we are from Enzo Komuna, we are in the thick of it and we know what really happened. But that's by the way. So essentially with the insecurity issue out of the way, so to speak, the ground was really set for people to come out and exercise their franchise. You know, and I can assure you that the turnout was massive, the turnout was really massive and people were very excited. Because I was in Anambara and many commentators had said that, well, they commended the Anambarians for coming out this many to vote because of what had transpired leading up to the elections. But there's also been a trend in Anambara in terms of the number of people that show out to vote or the percentage of people who show out to vote on a normal day. And this wasn't anything really different from what has been before now. So really, was it a massive show up? Yes, just like you said, the Anambara has traditionally had no turnout, so to speak, usually over and below, probably 20, 25 percent. Of course, I'm not sure it's equally entirely different from what obtains nationwide. It's just typical of the issue of voter party, which also has to do with the confidence people impose in the electoral process. But and also the the incidents of rigging. Sometimes people feel whether I vote or I don't vote, it doesn't really count. So why should I bother myself? But I think that, you know, we can begin to see substantial change, especially with this incidence of electronic transmission of results. So when people see that really they're not going to come and waste their time on election day, you know, that when they vote, their votes going to count. I definitely see that that's going to improve. But you know also that this is the first time we are trying electronic voting with Anambara, you know, in Anambara state. So I believe that going forward, this will help a lot in pushing the numbers as regards dealing with voter party, which is actually a national issue. Okay. Let me come to Gabriel Prince. Gabriel, you're of Yaga and Yaga also was part of the situation room and part of the observers at the Anambara elections, including the one that has happened today. But from a Yaga perspective, what has been your major deduction from this election in Anambara? Okay, prior to the election, there has always been a concern about security. And security, people were really scared on how to come out on votes. And people are really showing concern because it also affects our deployment at some point, whereby our observers are declining at that minute due to security or threat by any members of the community that election would not hold us was declined by the claim by the iPod members. So that also works due to kind of contingency plan that we have to be able to embrace that part to get other observers that will be able to mark our ability. But that not the standard. Prior to any election, mostly we will focus on that even in a do and own do. A lot of security challenges do pop up now is the pre-election phase, right? But when it comes to the actual election, definitely you will see that teams pack down and then election will go down as smooth. And you're wondering that, uh-uh, prior to this election, people are raising concern about security. But that being said, the Anambara has tried their possible best to see that even in the midst of the security challenge, they come out to come and cast their vote, which just we estimated based on our projection, we say that voter turnout is going to be between 10.2% to 12.8%. Yeah, Gabriel, just hold that thought. If you can hear me, Gabriel, can you turn down the volume of whatever, because we're hearing feedback. I don't know if it's a television or a radio, but we're hearing feedback. So if you can turn it down, that way we can hear you better. Okay, okay, okay. Thank you. Thank you for that. We are doing that right now. All right, good. Go ahead. Yeah, so also raise a lot of concern in the cases where people are thinking that nobody will even come out on election day to come and vote. But Anambara has tried to prove most people wrong, whereby we even have like reasonable number of registered voters that came out to cast their votes, which lead to the total vote cast that we have to be. And another issue again, we also see some issue of late deployment of an INEG staff and also the BVAS machine, which was deployed. Remember in Isoko, not INEG pilots, this BVAS machine, they experienced little or no challenge during that period due to the minimum number of polling units and the number of people that comes out to participate in that election. But looking at Anambara, Anambara is a bigger state and half a point number of population when it comes to voters. And then trying to deploy that technology, definitely they encountered a lot of challenges. We have like over 45% of the polling units. Yeah, we have the BVAS machine malfunctioning here. We also have the malfunction but fixed in just like five polling units, where in some polling units like 3% of the polling units we upset. Nobody, the machine malfunctioned and the INEG officials were not able to replace it on time, which lead to the suspension of the election. So putting all this together, we see that the election definitely comes with challenge, with INEG to work more harder on it and see how they can be able to improve on the BVAS machine. Looking at we have like two, we have up by two, we have equity, ocean and off-circle election that is coming on. And I believe by then INEG could be able to improve their system, upgrade it and be able to fix all challenges by the experience in Anambara come 2023. I'm curious Gabriel, do you also think that maybe the reason why INEG encountered so many problems as they prepared for this election, that maybe this could be tied to the fact that there was insecurity? Don't forget that some core members had pulled out and these are people who had been prepared for these elections, they had been trained but then they pulled out last minute. Don't forget INEG also had issues with the transporters. So if we're saying that INEG is getting ready for Shoa, Kiti and Ondo, can we say maybe INEG may not necessarily have to deal with the kind of things that they dealt with in Anambara, maybe it would help them get better or do you think that this is an INEG problem that needs to be fixed now, especially when we're also being optimistic about the electronic transmission of results? Is this something that is within INEG's reach? Okay, come to look at this. The issue in the South is a peculiar issue, right? And when you go down to the West where you have the equity and on ocean, which is coming up next year, now we are not expecting for an issue of high rate of like security and threats to the Nigerian southern tree in that part of our country and which we are hopeful that we will not have any other security challenge that we will be able to in the INEG from executing their primary responsibility. But notwithstanding people, you know they say safety first and safety is always paramount when it comes to any human survivor, right? So definitely it also affects the dropout of with all of some co-members which have been trained already to go and handle this machine, but they would do at the time it also affects INEG and deployment. So in terms of logistics and also the road transport, but I also have to comment on the road transport because they showed a lot of bravery in terms of deploying INEG staff to various locations and the deployment of security officials from different parts of the country by the police and the joint task force, which really help and provide safe haven. And if you look at it, that was even the reason why election was not able to conduct in Giala and some part of some part of the due to their high areas that they were. Prior to the election in Giala, there was a report of an explosion and there was also a lot of report of gunshot and killings in the state. So it quite unwise for INEG to say that they will deploy their staff in the kind of volatile area, even being prompt in what I've been informed about the security intelligence that is maybe security intelligence and how they should be able to conduct theirself there. And for now that ELA will be conducted today and still yet you see that definitely they have to channel their energy, their security and get their best staff to deploy to that particular local government so that election will be able to go down smoothly here. So security is always a problem and definitely INEG, they really tried, they could have to commit INEG in this aspect. There are highly blasts and also security agents that are there to help to secure the INEG staff and also the voters as well. It's a three-laydown, a great deal. Okay, let me come back to by Samadier Kay. When I started the conversation I did say that the other candidates from the other political parties aside from APCA are a bit hopeful that ELA will be a game changer. It will be, you know, in fact both Valentino Zibu and of course Andiubar is hoping that they will get victory by the time these results are announced. We're not here to pre-empt the results but then we know that ELA has 148,000 registered voters, but again you and I just quickly talked about the percentage of people who show up to vote. So can we examine why these candidates are so hopeful about ELA even when we know that 148,000 voters will not necessarily show up to the polls? Yes, you're quite right because if we go by the percentage that we've been getting traditionally, it would be a tough call to get maybe even 30 percent of the registered voters, which is just like you said about 148,000. And even if you get that, presently APCA is leading by about, is leading the next challenger Mr. Zibu with about 52,000 votes. So it will be quite a tough one really for any of these candidates to best APCA because again at any rate you know that APCA would also be just holding their hands. They will also be in the game just like they've been in the other local governments. So it's going to be quite tough for any of these other people to not candidates to offstage APCA even though from the fillers we are getting there, we understand that even the YPP candidate Senators, if Anye Uba is doing quite well in the election, maybe best in some of the other candidates. So it's definitely going to be too close to call, especially for the other candidates as regards offstaging APCA. But the election for now is done and dusted as regards voting. So we'll probably see what's going to happen in the next few hours. Let's talk about the incident that happened today, the gunshots and the you know face off between soldiers and iPod members. We have seen the election go smoothly in almost every area of the state. Why Igheela? Why a sudden surfacing of the so-called gunmen trying to scuttle the electoral process? Do you have any idea why this would be? I must say it's my knowledge is restricted to what I've read online. And so I wasn't able to hear that today. So but to that extent, what I can also tell you since you mentioned the iPod is that I'll be extremely reluctant to think that this is these are iPod members, you know, I'll be extremely reluctant because I know it from excellent authority that, you know, the highest command in iPod, you know, decided that this this election should go ahead. And in fact declared that anyone trying to do otherwise would be declared as a saboteur. So I doubt that this is this is an iPod. So you're telling me so you're telling me that contrary to what the papers are reporting or what media or whatever information that was given to the media, you're telling me that these are not necessarily iPod members that these could be caricatures or people who are trying to give iPod a bad name? Possibly people who are trying to give iPod a bad name, possibly even candidates who may think that they may gain advantage by, you know, commenting violence. But I'm iPod, I extremely doubt it. I extremely doubt it. I know that iPod was totally committed to this process going ahead. So I don't I don't blame this on iPod or even ESF. I would think that someone is trying to gain advantage of political. Okay, back to you Gabriel. A lot of people have said that they experienced some level of vote buying during the whole process in different parts of the state. In my polling units, I did see a little bit of that in the guise of trying to give voters some food and water. Money was exchanging hands. And one would hope that in a situation like this, especially that we are in 2021 and hoping for free fair and credible elections, that this would somewhat be played down on. But tell me what you as Yaga experience in terms of vote buying. Gabriel, can you hear me? Gabriel, are you there? Can you hear me? I think we lost that connection with Gabriel. So I'm going to come back to you by somewhat okay. So did you experience any form of vote buying? Did you see with your eyes or did you hear where they we saw a couple of videos that made made it to the internet. But while you were there, did you experience any actual polling unit? Yes, I can I can assure you that there was massive incidents of vote buying because on this this this is quite this was quite predominant. And honestly, you would think it was more like a bazaar, you know, and even some level of haggling. So a vote of prospective voter, a voter comes and maybe it is this is conversed by one one party and it's like how much are you offering? And if it's 2k or 1k, he will he will probably walk around and ask the other party or be conversed by the other party. So at the end of the day, he or she goes for the highest bidder. So this was massive. And in fact, a lot of a lot of incidences, it wasn't even only a lot of a lot of things we actually thrown out at voters. You see a situation where some party actually was sharing clothes or wrappers, you know, and of course this would be an election day. This was happening on election day. Was this happening? Certainly. It wasn't even it was at the polling it was at the polling unit. So they weren't hiding it, you know, it was like you you you go and vote you come you're probably given 2000 and you're given a rapper. So of course, if you have another party that is offering maybe only 1000, that party is certainly disadvantaged. And actually we have hard cases of parties offering as much as 10,000, 5,000, you know, during the election. And of course food in fact, we had of instances where you know, a particular party will come in the morning, they say take 2000 go for breakfast, then you come back when you vote, you take another portion. And I think it was three layers. So and then of course you saw, you know, some parties again, bringing food to the polling unit sharing food, given to INEC officials and policemen, you know, also INEC officials and policemen, I guess most of not all the parties, you know, had a budget for them. And if you don't, I'm more curious, I'm more curious to the resilience of the unambra people because from what the feel as I got while I was in the field, that the average unambra person cannot be induced no matter how much money you pay, no matter how much money you seem to offer them, you cannot change their mind in terms of voting. The truth of my time is that yes, of course, people, some people may really be deeply committed to a particular party, you know. So to that extent, they may as well actually collect your money and still vote, they are conscious both on our vote, you know, but otherwise that thesis, that wasn't what I experienced during the election, especially most of the buyers were for the higher speed. All right, quickly before we wrap up, Gabriel is back with us. Gabriel, I was asking a question before we lost you that did you experience any form of voter buying, I beg your pardon, did you see any form of inducements at the different polling units that you visited? Because we're talking about how we can do a way with votes buying, especially on election day, we see all kinds of inducements, maybe campaign periods just before the election. But what we were really looking forward to three fair incredible elections in Anamba, did you experience any such? Okay, voter inducement is becoming a culture, therefore you can hardly go to a particular polling unit and say that you will not experience one or two forms of voter inducement, even though as even the employees at their commission and also security agency trying to deter people from engaging maybe other political parties or their agents and getting them maybe buying voters votes at that particular place. So voters and the political party agent, they try to devise another new means for voter inducement in just some of them feeling really that we went in, maybe we deployed our observers to go and observe. There are some form of new form of tactics that they normally deployed whereby even it's difficult for even observers to take note of that whereby they would draw, they would drag this potential voter aside and then tell him who to vote for, give him some sort of statement by aside and then later the person will come to the polling unit and go and cast his vote. So those kind of voters inducement is they get to be difficult to track again, it's difficult to track, if not maybe sometimes you may just say that okay let me go and take a peek and then you will then see somebody at the backyard of a classroom trying to give people money, maybe they will tell you that this is a person that I vote for. So those kind of things people, political parties or other agents, they are devising a lot of different means for voters inducement and the new methods, the new strategies when I was adopted also helps to reduce this form of voter inducement whereby you are not allowed to go to a particular polling, in order to go to the polling, the voting cubicle with your phone, a security agent will be beside there and tell you that okay if you have any phone with you, can you kindly give me, after you cast your vote, you drop it in the ballot box then you get it back. That has also plays a lot of role in terms of reducing the rate of voter inducement in the field. Wow, well gentlemen we are keeping our fingers crossed, hoping to hear from the coalition center in Ihi'ala, that's the local government coalition center at 9 p.m. and then of course we will find out what the results for tonight's elections will be but Imekan Wadyoke is a legal practitioner and Gabriel Prince is the programs officer at Yaga Africa. Thank you so much gentlemen for being part of this conversation. Thank you, thank you. All right well thank you all for staying with us, we'll take a short break and when we return we focus on Maynard's pension fraud and of course the two banks that may be indicted in this stay with us.