We spent N7.7bn to print ballot papers for April polls - Iwu

Lanre Adewole and Idowu Samuel - 30.01.2008

A total of N7.7 billion was spent in printing ballot papers for the April 2007 general election, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has disclosed.

The commission also gave a breakdown of how the money was spent on the award of contracts for the ballot papers to the Nigeria Security Printing Minting Company (NSPMC).

INEC chairman, Professor Maurice Iwu, made the disclosure in his answer to the 27 questions asked him by the presidential candidate of the Action Congress in the April 21 presidential election, former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, as ordered by the Supreme Court.

He denied reports that the contracts for the printing of the ballot papers for the presidential election were awarded to an unnamed South African company.

Accompanying Iwu's response were documents showing that the contracts were awarded to the NSPMC. The documents also revealed that the contracts for the printing of ballot papers for the presidential election were awarded on April 17, 2007 immediately after the judgment of the Supreme Court which over-ruled INEC on the eligibility of Atiku to run for president.

The contracts sum was N1 billion at N16.50 per copy, with 65 million copies printed. The documents further showed that the cost of printing ballot papers for elections into legislative houses (states and federal) was at the same cost of N16.50 per copy.

It was also discovered that the commission spent N445 million to print 27 million ballot papers for senatorial, federal and state constituency for Federal Capital Territory, Nasarawa, Kogi, Benue, Plateau, Kwara and Niger.

Six hundred and sixty-eight million naira was spent on printing 40.5 million ballot papers for Kano, Katsina, Jigawa, Bauchi and Kaduna.
Providing 39 million ballot papers for Lagos, Oyo, Ogun, Osun, Ondo and Ekiti gulped N643 million while the commission printed 24 million ballot papers for Enugu, Anambra, Ebonyi, Delta and Edo at the cost N396 million.

The documents supplied by Iwu also showed that INEC printed 13.5 million ballot papers for Sokoto, Kebbi and Zamfara at N222 million and another 27.6 million ballot papers for Rivers, Cross River, Bayelsa, Akwa Ibom, Imo and Abia at the cost of N455 million.

Twenty one million ballot papers were printed at N346 million for Borno, Yobe, Gombe, Adamawa and Taraba states. INEC printed 77 million ballot papers at the cost of N1.2 billion for the governorship election in all the 36 states while it spent N2.1 billion to print ballot paper for the presidential election.

The January 4, 2007 date on the contract for the printing of these ballot papers showed that the contract had been awarded before the apex court cleared Atiku for the poll. As at the time in question, INEC had paid N6.6 billion for the first contract.

The apex court cleared Atiku for the poll on 16 April, 2007. On the 17th April, 2007, INEC awarded a fresh contract for N1 billion to accommodate Atiku's name on the ballot papers.

“The commission did not award any such contract and no such discussion with any company in South Africa occurred. “There was no re-award of the contract as alleged. The contract to the Nigerian Security Printing and Minting Company arose as aforesaid from the need to comply with the judgment of the Supreme Court delivered on the 16th day of April, 2007,” he said.

On questions relating to the unnamed South African company, Iwu said that he could not provide answers because the said company had no contractual agreement with the commission. However, he was of an opinion that if the foreign company was given any job to do on the ballot papers, the arrangement must have been between the Security Printing and Minting Company and the South African Company, a contract to which INEC was not privy.

He admitted the ballot papers printed for the presidential election after the Supreme Court judgment were not serially numbered. According to him, “because of the extremely limited time for their printing, they were packed in bundles of equal quantity so that the quantity delivered could be easily ascertained.”

He also attached the list of presidential election candidates for the 2007 poll which included the name of Atiku and his running mate, Senator Ben Obi. They were number 25 on the list of the presidential candidate.

Atiku had claimed in his petition that he was unlawfully excluded from the poll. On the award of contract for the erection of voting cubicles to be used for thumb-printing ballot-papers in secret before dropping same in the ballot boxes in the open, Iwu said, ‘To the best of my knowledge, INEC did not award any contract for the erection of voting cubicles. INEC awarded contracts for the supply of mobile or collapse cubicles for the 2007 elections.”

Responding to the question on the display of voters' registers used for the presidential election and how long the display lasted, Iwu stated that, “The voters list for the presidential election was the same list used for other elections as produced and displayed by INEC.

"INEC displayed the voters list for purposes of public scrutiny from Saturday, February 5th to February 10th in the first instance for corrections and objections. Additional display was made from March 30th and sustained throughout to election period to guide voters to the polling units.”