An election monitoring group, Yiaga Africa, has disclosed that the organisation will deploy 324 election observers across the 18 Local Government Areas of Ondo State.
Yiaga Africa also revealed that its team would use an advanced election-day observation methodology called the Process and Results Verification for Transparency (PRVI) for the Election Day observation.
According to the organisation, the “Ondo State governorship election, #WatchingTheVote will deploy observers to a representative random sample of 300 polling units in every local government in the state.”
Addressing journalists during Yiaga Africa Watching the Vote (WTV)- Elections Academy CSO Leaders and Media Partners in Akure, the Ondo State capital, Yiaga Programme Manager Paul James, informed that 300 WTV Polling Unit Observers will be deployed to observe the accreditation, voting, and counting processes on election day.
James further noted that “WTV will also have 24 mobile (roving) observers present in all the 18 Local Government Areas (LGAs).”
He states, “The PRVT is an election-day observation methodology that leverages statistics and technology to observe the voting process, counting, and tallying results.
“Citizen observers are deployed to randomly sampled polling units to collect data on the conduct of elections and official polling unit-level results.
“With the results assembled from the sampled polling units, a citizen observer group can release projected estimates and verify the accuracy of results declared by the election management body.
“Using this methodology, observer reports are sent via SMS to a central database, which enables WTV to analyse and share timely findings on the election’s conduct in near real-time.
‘The PRVT allows Yiaga Africa’s WTV to present an accurate and comprehensive assessment of the election day processes, such as whether election officials comply with the guidelines for the conduct of elections, the presence of security agents, the presence and behaviour of party agents, the secrecy of the ballot and transparency of the counting process.
‘It is the only observation methodology that can independently verify the accuracy of election day results as released by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), which is legally mandated.
“Accordingly, every observer deployed sends the election results from the polling units as announced on election day. They will use their mobile phones to send coded text messages (SMS) of observation reports to Yiaga Africa’s WTV Data Centre in Benin.