The National Independent Electoral Commission (INEC) in Benue on Tuesday said that it received 5000 card readers for the March 28 and April 11 general elections.
The INEC Resident Electoral Commissioner, Prof. Istifinus Dafwang, made this known in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Makurdi.
Dafwang said the card readers were in excess of 400, stressing the excess would be kept on standby as replacement to anyone which malfunctioned during the process of accreditation.
He said the commission was leaving nothing to chance in the conduct of credible elections in the state, and stressed INEC was committed to make every vote to count.
The commissioner said INEC had made contingency plans for the replacement of any card reader snatched by thugs, adding that the elections would not be cancelled on frivolous grounds.
He said the failure rate of the card readers in verifying fingerprints during their mock trial in some states were too negligible and insignificant to affect the credibility of the polls.
According to him, once a voter is identified by the card reader as an authentic voter, even when the machine does not verify his/her fingerprints, such a voter will be allowed to vote in the elections.
He appealed to Nigerians to have confidence in the ability of INEC to conduct credible elections and refrain from acts that would subvert the electoral process.
