The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) will deploy CCTVs and other electronic devices to monitor Saturday’s National Assembly election in some hot spots in the country, the commission’s Chairman, Prof. Attahiru Jega, has said.

Jega also clarified the decision on the deployment of troops for the polls, saying the soldiers would not be at the polling stations or near the polling units but would be stationed in their barracks or nearby ready to assist the police in the event of a break out of violence or disruption of the electoral process.

The INEC chairman spoke in an interactive session with journalists Wednesday in Abuja.

He said the CCTVs and other electronic devices would be engaged on experimental basis to give INEC the opportunity to verify election process in hotly contested areas and if there is fraud or violence, the commission would know in advance.

“It’s not going to be nationwide, though we will keep on scaling that up. If there is violence in such hot spots, we will now have an evidence to present. Courts now accept electronic evidences. All these we are doing is to bring additional credibility to the electoral process,” he said.

INEC will also use the tracking devices of the Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) on vehicles that will be used in transporting some sensitive materials to difficult polling areas.

“The FRSC vehicles that are tracked will be in our convoy of sensitive materials. Already these materials have arrived and are being kept in CBN’s vaults and when we move them, the FRSC vehicles will be with us,” he added.

Jega said the commission had concluded preparations for the election, printed sensitive and non-sensitive materials for the poll and new security features had also been introduced into the election ballots.

He said for instance, ballots now have unique identification number such that if they are stolen and recycled, the commission would know while it is also difficult to use ballots stolen from one constituency in another.

“We in INEC are ready and prepared. We can look at what we have been doing in different phases. We have done restructuring, we have improved election management. In doing this, we are careful not to engage in what is called disruptive restructuring. We looked at existing structure and restructured properly,” he said.

According to Jega, 400,000 ad hoc staff had also been trained, mostly National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) members, and an average of three would be engaged in each polling station.

Responding to a question, the INEC chairman said the commission was targeting declaring election results within 48 hours.

“We are targeting 48 hours. We expect that within that time, the results would have been verified and INEC will be confident that what it is announcing are the authentic results,” he added.

He said the electoral act was clear on which electoral officer is competent to announce results at what level, explaining that results would be declared at the various levels after collation and a situation where results of election meant to be released in the states are announced in Abuja would not occur.

Jega also stated that the commission had finalised the party nomination process which he described as one of the most challenging undertakings of INEC because of the need to ensure due process and internal democracy in the task.

On multiple registration, he said INEC had established 870,000 cases of double and multiple registration and that those involved would be prosecuted.

He denied saying that some top government officials were involved in the infraction, explaining that what he said was that INEC had evidence of high profile double or multiple registrants.

On whether he was not afraid for his life in the light of efforts he is putting in place to combat rigging, Jega said he was not worried.

“I’m not worried. I’m a believer and in my religion, we believe in pre-destination. When I will die and how I will die have all been pre-determined. I’m not worried about my belief, if I’m worried, I would not have taken the INEC job,” he said.