The Electoral Institute of South Africa, EISA, has sent no fewer than 30 observers across Nigeria, ahead of tomorrow’s Presidential and National Assembly elections.
Leader of the South African observation team, who is also former President of Zambia, Rupia Banda, made the disclosure when the delegation paid a courtesy visit to the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, in Abuja, yesterday.
Banda said they are in Nigeria because the country is too important to the progress, unity and peace of the African continent and the entire world.
“The importance of Nigeria to Africa and, indeed, the world can not be overstated, so, we are very honoured to be here, in order to observe and to see how the elections will take place.
“A team of about 30 people will be deployed to various parts of this great nation. We look forward to observe this successful and peaceful election as it takes place this weekend.
“We know how complex the size of the country and the size of the population of Nigeria is. Therefore, we wish Nigerians, under your leadership, chairman very successful elections. We wish you well on what you have put in with the election population.
“The presidential candidates are unbelievable. In our country, I told the people of Zambia that the list of candidates for the presidential election is almost the number of the whole parliament in our country, so, we know how complicated it is,” Banda noted.
INEC chairman, Mahmood Yakubu, who welcomed the delegation said the commission looks forward to the recommendations of their observations and will implement those that would enhance the electoral process in Nigeria.
“EISA has been supporting democracy and the democratisation process not only in Nigeria, but, elsewhere as well. It led successful missions to Sierra Leone and Liberia, in July 2017, ahead of their elections and EISA provided resource persons,” he said.
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