2015 Polls: Tmg Says Presidential, National Assembly Results From South-south Were Inflated

BEVERLY HILLS, April 02, (THEWILL) – Nigeria's foremost election observation group, the Transition Monitoring Group, TMG has released a report where it noted that results of the 2015 Nigeria's Presidential and National Assembly elections from the South-South geopolitical zone were probably inflated by officials of Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.

It would be recalled that former President Goodluck Jonathan, the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, swept the polls in his South-South homestead as well as in the South-East, while votes cast in the North-West and the North-East were heavily in favour of President Muhammadu Buhari who was the candidate of All Progressives Congress, APC. Buhari hails from Katsina state in the North-West.

But in the report titled “TMG Quick Count Report of the 2015 Presidential Election” launched in Abuja on Friday, TMG noted that its estimates in the North West and the other zones, apart from the South-South, ran consistent with INEC's official release, stressing that it deployed approximately 4,000 citizen observers to carry out representative observation of polling units across the 774 Local Government Areas.

Although the report showed that estimates by TMG's Quick Count correlated with official results finally released by INEC, the group however said the number of accredited voters was inflated during the collation exercise, suggesting a way of creating room for inflated results.

“In verifying the official results of the 2015 presidential election, the Quick Count estimates strongly suggested that turnout was inflated during the collation process in the South-South geopolitical zone,” the report said.

“Quick Count estimates for the South-South geopolitical zone was 40.6% (+/-4.5%) while the official result the zone was as released at 55.9%. Thus official turnout was likely inflated during the collation exercise by at least 10.8%. The official results of the other five geopolitical zones consistent with TMG's Quick Count estimates.”

The group's Program Manager, Lazarus Apir explained that its observers reported on the poll, accreditation, voting, counting processes and collected voting results at the polling units.

“At the heart of the Quick Count is a sophisticated database and text messaging communication systems by highly trained data managers and data clerks to ensure that complete and accurate data is received from all observers and analysed … to form highly accurate estimates of the overall poll conduct of the election, including party vote counts and voter turnout,” he said.

The TMG explained that the deployment party agents by the APC to the polling units in South-South and South-East was and 85% and 80% respectively. But in the two regions, PDP deployed agents to 93% of the polling units.

The report showed that the APC perhaps deliberately de-emphasize focus on the South-South and South-East, two strongholds of PDP, concentrating on other zones where it deployed more agents to polling units than PDP did.

Quick Count reported the presence of security personnel in 88% of the polling units. But this was poor when compared with 94% security presence across all polling units during the 2011 elections, TMG said.

While recommending how to improve Nigeria's electoral process, the organization advised that political parties and candidates restrict their campaigns to Nigeria's development issues.

2015 Polls: TMG Says Presidential, National Assembly Results From South-South Were Inflated

Nigeria's foremost election observation group, the Transition Monitoring Group, TMG has released a report where it noted that results of the 2015 Nigeria's Presidential and National Assembly elections from the South-South geopolitical zone were probably inflated by officials of Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.

It would be recalled that former President Goodluck Jonathan, the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, swept the polls in his South-South homestead as well as in the South-East, while votes cast in the North-West and the North-East were heavily in favour of President Muhammadu Buhari who was the candidate of All Progressives Congress, APC. Buhari hails from Katsina state in the North-West.

But in the report titled “TMG Quick Count Report of the 2015 Presidential Election” launched in Abuja on Friday, TMG noted that its estimates in the North West and the other zones, apart from the South-South, ran consistent with INEC's official release, stressing that it deployed approximately 4,000 citizen observers to carry out representative observation of polling units across the 774 Local Government Areas.

Although the report showed that estimates by TMG's Quick Count correlated with official results finally released by INEC, the group however said the number of accredited voters was inflated during the collation exercise, suggesting a way of creating room for inflated results.

“In verifying the official results of the 2015 presidential election, the Quick Count estimates strongly suggested that turnout was inflated during the collation process in the South-South geopolitical zone,” the report said.

“Quick Count estimates for the South-South geopolitical zone was 40.6% (+/-4.5%) while the official result the zone was as released at 55.9%. Thus official turnout was likely inflated during the collation exercise by at least 10.8%. The official results of the other five geopolitical zones consistent with TMG's Quick Count estimates.”

The group's Program Manager, Lazarus Apir explained that its observers reported on the poll, accreditation, voting, counting processes and collected voting results at the polling units.

“At the heart of the Quick Count is a sophisticated database and text messaging communication systems by highly trained data managers and data clerks to ensure that complete and accurate data is received from all observers and analysed … to form highly accurate estimates of the overall poll conduct of the election, including party vote counts and voter turnout,” he said.

The TMG explained that the deployment party agents by the APC to the polling units in South-South and South-East was and 85% and 80% respectively. But in the two regions, PDP deployed agents to 93% of the polling units.

The report showed that the APC perhaps deliberately de-emphasize focus on the South-South and South-East, two strongholds of PDP, concentrating on other zones where it deployed more agents to polling units than PDP did.

Quick Count reported the presence of security personnel in 88% of the polling units. But this was poor when compared with 94% security presence across all polling units during the 2011 elections, TMG said.

While recommending how to improve Nigeria's electoral process, the organization advised that political parties and candidates restrict their campaigns to Nigeria's development issues.