A serving senator, representing Southern Kaduna Senatorial district, Mrs. Esther Nenadi Usman, has expressed fear over the proposed use of card readers by Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), during the forthcoming general elections, saying it would disenfranchise many eligible voters.

Speaking shortly after an outreach programme for Goodluck/Sambo 2015 to over 300 support groups in Kaduna on Friday, Senator Nenadi said the card reader do not work fast enough to be able to accredit many people, and might lead to the disenfranchisement of a lot of Nigerians.

“I think the card reader is a good thing but the only disadvantage is that many people are going to be disenfranchised on the day of elections. Because the card reader from what I saw at the demonstration in the senate, it cannot possibly accredit more than one person per minute. So it has been programmed that on that day it is going to accredit for 5 hours. And if it is going to accredit one person per minute it means in an hour it will accredit 60 people. It means that in 5 hours it will do accreditation for 300 people.

“So if a polling unit has more than 300 people I don’t see more than 300 people getting accreditation done. So that is just the issue.The card reader is a good thing. It is just that it doesn’t work fast enough to be able to accredit many people as it is suppose to do because the process it takes like I said. So my fear is that many people will be disenfranchised on that day.

“Accreditation is like bring your PVC to the card reader, then it will pick the informations. It is a technical think and it is just for INEC to improve on it,” She stated.

Meanwhile, Senator Nenadi commended the over 300 support groups who took advantage of the forum to endorse the administration of President Goodluck Jonathan and his Vice, Architect Mohammed Namadi Sambo for continuity.

•Photo shows Usman

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