The International Federation of Women Layers, FIDA, Nigeria with support from Goree Institute under the Charter Africa Project has finished preparations to observe the participation of women and persons with disabilities at the Saturday, June 17 governorship election in Osun State.
Mrs Amina Suzanah Agbaje, Country Vice /National President FIDA Nigeria said FIDA would work through trained citizen observers deployed across the 30 Local Government Areas of Osun State.
She said; “An election monitoring tool has been developed and our approach in observation will be both qualitative and quantitative as we will leverage on partnerships with other civil society actors in documenting election incidences promoting violence against women and persons with disabilities at the polls.
“FIDA Nigeria citizen’s engagement will be made possible through the establishment of a situation room in Oshogbo, the Osun State Capital, and our National Secretariat where our Data Analysts will be documenting and analyzing findings from our citizen observers through the help of civic technology.
Expressing her expectation that the increase in registered voter from 1.6m in the 2018 governorship poll to 1.95m in 2022 will translate to more voters especially women and persons with disabilities participation at the polls, she called for need to secure the polls through “strategic deployment of security personnel across the 3,763 polling units; INEC logistical arrangements to aid priority voting for vulnerable groups; Functionality of the Bimodal Voters Accreditation System to aid the accreditation and voting process at the polls,”
“FIDA Nigeria calls on women, persons with disabilities, and the good people of Osun State to exercise their franchise at the polls peacefully and resist any form of vote inducement and shun all forms of electoral violence. Political parties are also enjoined to conduct themselves creditably in order to promote a peaceful process, she said.
She expressed mixed feelings about the organisation’s pre-election observation, in which, ” we observed that none of these fielded candidates are neither females or persons with disabilities which has imposed some limits on the aspirations of women and persons with disabilities for the highest executive position in the state. We however appreciate the fact that six of the political parties contesting at the polls fielded women aged between 36-60 years as Deputy Governorship Candidates.”
