 Under-aid persons will not be allowed to vote in 2023. Director of Voter Education and Publicity, Inek Victor Aluko, says as CSOs seek sanctions against under-aid voting ahead of 2023 election. And we're working to reconcile with G5, or COA, says as PCC spokesperson insists we case non-support won't affect Attico's chances. This is Plus Politics. I am Mary Anacom. The Independent National Electoral Commission, Inek, has insisted that no under-aid persons will be allowed to vote in the force coming 2023 general elections. The commission also retreated its assurance to the Nigerian electorate that citizens who have yet to attain a legal voting age will not be allowed to participate in the polls. The chairman, transitioning monitoring group, Awal Moussa, has also called on Nigerians to be vigilant and ready to defend democracy, affirming that the threat to 2023 general elections is real. He said that while Nigerians are preparing to exercise their civic rights in electing leaders that will solve the myrids of challenges confronting the country, some politicians are scheming to stop election or ensure the poll is not free-fair and credible. Well, joining us today as we speak on civic education and voter education, we have Abhaniwal Nathaniel, he's the executive director of Rebus Community Advancement Initiative, and we also have joining us Paul James. He's the head of elections, Yaga Africa. Thank you so much gentlemen for joining us. Thank you very much Mary. Great. No better group of persons to have this conversation with than you who are obviously on the ground doing a lot of work in terms of educating the people and of course those who have been monitoring the elections. But I'll start with you Abhaniwal. You obviously seem like a grass-free person and you work with people in communities. The issue of multiple underage voter registration came back up in the news recently because of concerns that have been raised but the beautiful part of it is that the people in the North are seemingly the ones who have raised this alarm as opposed to those who are onlookers who see these things happening and ask that INEC wade into the matter. But my question is, why does INEC have to wait for us or should I say, do we have to tell INEC that we do not want underage voters as opposed to INEC making sure as they go through the process of cleaning the register that this doesn't happen in 2023? I'm going to tell you very much, but I think about, the position of the law in square has to do, it should be registered to be eligible to vote. And as we know, the age of the teen years is also very important. And the first question we need to ask ourselves, how do people get into the process? That is one of the concerns we raise. It starts from the process of registration and part three of the electoral act is very clear as to who does the registration and keeps and maintain the voters register. That is solely the responsibility of finding. So for us on the head, we want to find a way into the employees that is sitting on the side. And we must also raise this so that we cannot repeat what happened in 2019 where we have clearly on the train of to vote. And of course, now, even at the election day, why would an electoral officer allow children to be in the process? Since they are trying their way into the race, I think it's something that we also need to begin to look at, particularly. Yes, the voters register according to I-Lang as we play, does this entail the on the head vote us? Or is it the only issues of the voters who are taking care of? And if we continue with two critical elections, we should begin to look at how to have a credible voter registration and a voter register that can keep clearly what we do is having to be the responsibility of choosing the next leader. So if we continue this way, I think we are also having to work on this in 2019 where we still have children who are less than 15 years stay voted. So hope for us today is a deal of concern and then we need to look at this critically. Thank you. Person, the reason why I started with you and asked that question is because of the issue of, these young persons, these underage voters are from communities and the people who are lining up side by side them are also from their communities. They know them. They know that they're too young to be voting. As much as INEC has its job cut out for it, what role should communities be playing in making sure that even though INEC is doing what it can, they also make sure that this does not recur? Yeah. Do you place on the right a question again? I'm saying as community and grassroots people, you obviously, these young people who are underage, who line up to vote on election day are from your communities. And I'm saying what is the role of community members and people CSOs like you at the grassroots to make sure that this doesn't recur, even though INEC has its job cut out for it? Yes. Your purpose is to place a system of electorates. So to let me know one implications of being among the reporters, but making their way into the records. And our part is more of education and system usage. But our role is to meet people as person and the role of getting those people into the reporter of the records. And this is what bring up, you know, advocating. Now, you, we are the government of the local register, we're going to the communities and sensitize the people to speak a little bit while they should or get on the register of the records. But our duty also is to know become who finds the way back. However, it's the duty of the IMA option. We, this same set of people present themselves to the register. Because we belong in their way of forming the register. Our job is to communicate with the station, to communicate with the station and show that the people are out to the register. This is what we like to do within the communities. All right, let me go to Paul. Paul, just to take it from where he stopped. Like I asked, he, there's a role that INEC plays, of course. INEC is supposed to do a thorough job in making sure that the people who are registered are not on the aid. But again, I asked a question about the people who live amongst them. Because of course, we're all asking for free, fair, credible elections and we all have a role to play. But he did say something about the fact that it's also the duty of politicians and political parties. But if it's beneficial to me that young people who are underage are casting their votes for me, why would I want to wait in? Exactly. I think the first point to note here is that elections and their outcomes are largely dependent on the electorates and not necessarily on the politicians. As much as sometimes the politicians are the beneficiaries of this outcome, it is the people that they have to vote. It is also the people that go to register. Now, I have followed through the process of the voter registration since it started in June of last year up until the end, sometimes in August of this year. And I can tell you, based on the findings via Africa, most of these locations where we observe, you rarely can find party agents at those locations. You see individuals, you see young people, you see unequal officials that are administering the process of the registration. And so the parties get to benefit by the time that process is concluded. Is that what we want to be saying in our election? No, not necessarily. And then that's just what Anneke on his part is beginning to say. You can actually tie this underage registration to some of the dubious officials that allow it to happen. And so we wait on Anneke to see what Anneke is going to be about this and also to make a point that underage registration is even more complicated because I heard him mention things about deleting records from the register. It is easier to delete multiple registrations than to delete underage registration because based on the INED guideman, especially for the process of hearing claims and objection, if you have any objection to make, for instance, on the basis that someone is underage or someone is diseased, then the only source of proof is on the person that is making the claim. The person has to bring a very certificate, the person has to bring a death certificate. That is even what makes it complicated. And also to make the point that most of these underage registration that we're seeing now, most of them are even from the 2019 registration. It is becoming more pronounced and people are making more noise about it now because of the opportunity that technology presents. Most of these are, if you like, on the electronic version of the register that Anneke has submitted online. People are drawing most of the conclusions from it. But then we thank technology because, of course, if you want to have the credibility of the electronic process begins to enlarge a step from the quality of the voter register. And so I think it's a step in the right direction. But then I also wait to see how the claims and objection, especially on the underage voters will pan out. When Anneke will do a turnip job there, and then we'll also expect at the end that we'll have a good register for the election. Moving away from that, let's talk about something that the chairman of the TMG raised a concern. He said something in the line that he accused politicians generally for creating insecurity to justify the looting of our public coffers. And this is not the first time you and I would be hearing that there are certain politicians, governors, et cetera, et cetera, who might be behind the election, pre-election violence, even election violence, and of course all of the insecurity we're seeing across the country. Where do we even start to deal with this kind of issue? Because being that these are people who are in power, who the law actually empowers to make sure that we are protected from all of these insecurities that are happening. But then, if we're hearing that these people are the perpetrators of the insecurity, where do we go from here? I think I share the same concern because in recent past, some of the observations we have made about election-related violence is that you can add them to these politicians, especially in the build-up to election. I think one of the things we are beginning, the new trends we are beginning to see is the weaponization of violence. If you go back to the Edo election that happened in 2020, as well as the older election, based on the observer reports we got in the pre-election phase, 18 local governments in older state, 13 local governments were dealing with differences of pre-election violence. The same also in older different kinds of pre-election-related violence. If you also go to the unhandled election, if you remember, that was also the case of of course the non-state actors that were insisting that election was not even going to hold in that energy, which to some person, even, we thought has some political polarization, because for instance, we wanted to hold an engagement with the traditional institutions and I'm pressing at some point, they had to cancel that engagement because of the trust by the by the non-state actors. This is even how powerful that they have become. And so we have seen that also tripling, even as a plan for the 2020 pre-election, the sense why I'm getting in this is that politicians who put so much strength in minds of the voters, so that they don't get to go out to engage the process. And then the press of the past have also shown that it is where voters don't get to go out, that when the teachers manipulate the process. So they try to be where you have no turnout and then get to engage or manipulate the process. But then on the flip side also is even they engage with security agencies. If you look at the trend also that have been happening, most of these security agencies will wait very close to the election because they need to do what they call show of force. That happening they do, that happening although and even all the other elections in recent times, they wait until the week of the election before they come in with their gadgets, they come in with their power and all of that. And for any voter that has seen the threats before election, of course you want to value the life first before you think about it in the electioneering process. So I think that has been the challenge. If we think it has to be a reverse engagement that is timely, that is all that promises early. For instance, we already know where some of these concerns are. What sort of security market is happening already? What sort of assurance are the security agencies giving the voters that their rights and properties will be protected even as they go out to exercise their fundamental rights. So I think those are the kind of conversations we need to begin to have now. 90 days is not too long from now. We are also already seeing some improvement actually in the security from the security architecture and also in the management of some of the security crisis. But how long will that continue? The biggest threat even in this election is the attack that we are beginning to see on INEG. In recent times we saw the attack that happened in Ohio. How long will that continue? How long is that going to affect planning for INEG? I think that should be the biggest for everybody going forward. That should be the biggest priority but I'm going to come back to you but let me go to Nathaniel. Oh, I think we lost Nathaniel's connection there. So I'm going to stay with you Paul. Now, the presidential candidates of the Action Alliance, Major Hamza to our most stuff are retired, had raised an alarm on the issue of arms proliferation and I remember five, six, if not eight years ago when I started reporting on guns and ammunition finding its way into the center of the country before half the time they're being discovered. One of the most interesting ones was the one that was stopped in South Africa on its way to Nigeria. At some point we heard that they were coming from Israel but then that was the end of the story. We remember that soldiers had to stop somewhere in the middle of town. It had gone through clearance through customs. It came into the country. The biggest question is who are importing these guns? Where are the guns going to? Have we gotten to hear the last when it comes to these arms and ammunition that are being brought into the country every other day? Because Mustafa is saying that these might be a threat in the 2023 elections. In the first question there this is also based on the fact that as part of the preparation assessment by Yaya Africa we have the questions where we track the build-up especially in the gathering of arms and life weapons by politicians and also the improvement of political talks. This is not even a recent phenomenon. If you go back also to the election that has always been this concern of gathering of arms and life weapons again I go back to Onglu and go back to Edo in 2020. It was a big issue in those two elections. Now this also brings the concern, I mean brain to fall the concern about our borders. Our borders are so porous. The last time I think the president was engaged on the concerns about people bringing ammunition he raised a complaint about what has happened in Libya and also that Nigeria was suffering in the devastating effect of that. He blamed the worse and the likes for that. Beyond that is what sort of intelligence gathering has happened in the country. We are already in so much crisis that we cannot allow this to continue to freshen up. So Al-Mustahab could be right. He has been in the security cycle and of course he may have more information than I have at my disposal. But to what extent also is he engaging with the powers that be with the secure pages to see how we come up with this. For instance, when we did the election in observation that happened sometimes in June-July this year. I remember now in Yemen with Justin Babachunde Koukoumawu was the BRG in charge of the election. We raised those concerns about some part of the states. What we had about the builder of arms and also our might repose. He promised us that we were going to do that more because of course we have provided information at that point in time. So that is what I expect. If we can take them off from there. Well, Al-Mustafa was at an event. Apparently he was at a round table discussion with the theme contemporary security challenges and the effects to the 2023 general election. Now I'd like to quote something that he said again. He said as of today all agencies in Nigeria and I'm sure the representative of the idea of police is here. If he's aware of what I'm going to talk about. New discoveries of movements of drugs arms coming into the country through numerous borders in large quantities. He says I'm talking of it now as I speak but I'm sure society is not aware because you said that you might not be privy to some of the information he has. He's a former general in the army so he has his privy to some of this information. Now I want to talk about immigration and customs. Now for customs they gladly now tell us how much money they've generated every year. They seem to be more interested in income generation as opposed to their duty. Immigration on the other hand are interested in inducements as opposed to the duty of protecting our borders. So again, can this just be what's us, you know, fall on the back of a chicken and we'll just talk about it because it's election season as opposed to people doing their jobs. Is there any repercussion for not doing jobs rightly in this country? If there be any, why is it not taking force? I think it's a failure of society. It's not like we don't know these issues or we also don't know where these problems are emanating from. For this sort of concern to be raised by somebody that I think is highly connected especially from the security cycle, it tells you how grievous this thing is. It's just about where we are going to see the will from the head of these agencies to ensure that we see some sort of action, especially as we are headed into the tick of the election season. It is sad that this is happening and we are making more clear of it. It is sad that our borders, especially the progress nature of our borders have become topics for discussion almost in every cycle that you go to. So I think it's just to leave it at the doorstep of the security agencies but also as civil society organizations and also actors in the space to continue to bring to them on the need to provide that protection that is needed as people continue to engage the process. Let's talk about IDPs. We can't talk about the elections without bringing the issue of IDPs here. We have about 2 million plus if I'm not mistaken in Benway. We have IDPs everywhere. I just realized we also have IDPs in a dose state and they spread all about I've spoken to INEC this before and they said these people can be captured. But what is the fate of these people being that we've also had the issue of floodings that have also misplaced people. How is INEC going to cover this and will it have an adverse effect on the elections and the outcome? Certainly it might but I know there have been some high-level conversation within the INEC cycle on the way to mainstream the people in the IDP camps. I found that in 2019 where they conducted election in the camps. I expect that it's going to be a similar arrangement. I know there has been a conversation about the framework legal framework that will allow INEC to be able to do that. INEC has done a lot of the mappings not only Benway and Edo we still have IDPs we have IDPs now also in the light. I know those mappings have been done by INEC and there is also a commitment on the part of INEC to ensure an inclusive process. So as the days unfold we hope to see whatever plan that INEC has for them as the days unfold. But I think they will go back with the plan as they did the last time of hosting polling units in the IDP camps and for the two elections in those camps. I anticipate that it's going to be the same modus operandi this time around. Finally let's talk about we the people because you see when we're doing this civic education it's not necessarily for politicians it's for us the people. Now the average person right now is being taken by the campaigns where my candidates is better than your candidates or I support this person or not the intrigues and the theatrics is what's the order even the papers are joining in the party and that seems to be the headline. But what should we do the people be focusing our attention and what should be the conversations that we're having right now as we speak. Nathaniel I see that you're back but Poc if you can quickly answer that what should be you know headlining the conversations that we're having as opposed to the jaw drawing and the war over this candidate and that candidate. I think it's the global people how we started if we recall on September 28 when the party primary started officially our party campaign started officially there was the peace signing agreement which is supposed to be symbolic the parties committed to ensuring a peaceful campaign process so I mean if you also understand the spirit and the latter beyond all of that and the carnival of individuals that were assembled in that room where that event held of course you know that everybody think peace is paramount and also the need for an issue-based campaign as the politicians engage of course they think it is through this sensational engagement through this rhetoric of his speech misinformation and all of that that they think they will survive in the murky waters of our politics so our finances to begin to sound that remind us to them. I know INF for instance it's coming up with a document that will spell out the penalties for engaging in all of this it's not like we don't have those already the laws are there but of course sometimes you need to be reminding them the IDDP has also strongly come out to warn against that so I want to see Sancho now I want to see that they begin to pick some of these politicians so that it will serve as lesson for others and will help also to sanitize the process going forward. Alright finally let me come back to you I think you went off for a bit. If you're there can you hear me? Nathaniel Nathaniel can you hear me? I think well we lost that connection again okay finally Paul before we go there are people who are saying that INEC might reopen its registration process. Many people have complained about the fact that they had changed their polling units to someplace that is close to some but then now that they're looking through the register they don't see anything they don't see their names it looks like that registration or that change of location has become invalid but looking at the time that we have between now and the election season can INEC address all of these issues in time and update the voter register for February Yes it's possible to update the register especially for transfers the guide line the INEC guide man says transfers can be done up to 60 days before an election if you look at the window we have we still have like 90 days before the election so I think in the next 30 days whoever wants to do the transfer can initiate the process of that transfer and also following the Electoral Officers through the INEC rest of the Electoral Commissioners in their different states and ensure that as for the estation for the voter registration process the law is very clear that the process should end 90 days to the election as it is now we have like either 91 or 92 days until that election we all have been the advocates for INEC to extend the timing for this but INEC has also come up with its own reasons why it needed to stop at some point this is the biggest election ever over 93 million according to INEC so far and then we need to clean up the evidence and that is why we are doing display claims and objection now and then we need to produce voter card at the end of the cleaning up exercise let us not forget that it is after this display claims and objection that INEC will produce the last batch of the voter card before they start the distribution of the voter card and then begin to plan for the election I think we should allow INEC the time we should allow INEC also to I don't think there is any need for this one to sweep this process at this point in time well Paul James is of Yaga Africa Paul always a pleasure to have you have this conversation with you thank you very much Mary for the invitation thank you, I appreciate it well thank you all for staying with us we will take a quick break when we return we will continue our discussion on the PDP and its internal struggles as we speak Governors are in all my here kicking off of course the Governorship campaigns out there will talk with a representative of the People's Democratic Party after this break