Ahead of the November 8, 2025 Anambra governorship elections, Yiaga Africa has reiterated the role of Civil Society Organisations and media collaboration to improve citizens’ participation and bridge the gap between citizens and government through data-driven election observation.
This was revealed during the Process and Results Verification for Transparency held on Friday, in Awka, Anambra State capital, to educate CSO leaders and media practitioners on data-driven election observation methodology.
Speaking during the event themed, ‘CSO Leaders and Media Roundtable on Election with a focus on Anambra State’, the Director of Programmes, Yiaga Africa, Cynthia Mbamalu, said the exercise aims to sensitise participants to the overview of ‘Watching The Vote’ project for the 2025 Anambra governorship election, deployment plans and electoral reform agenda.
The event, according to Mbamalu, also discusses political and security trends ahead of the Anambra governorship election.
Participants were also exposed to PRVT and what to expect from PRVT process data and results data as well as communicating election findings.
During an interview with journalists, Mbamalu also identified the general lapses reported during the two by-elections in the state and how to tackle them to ensure the success of the November 8 election, adding that Yiaga will deploy 250 observers in addition to 22 mobile observers.
She said, “Watching the vote is a citizens led election observation initiative aimed at enhancing integrity of elections in the country.
“It works to ensure that citizens understand what happens in the electoral process and how to engage the process with the information.
“This exercise is very important because Anambra is the only off-cycle governorship election in 2025.
“It is important because it will give us the opportunity to see how Independent National Electoral Commission is prepared in order to avoid the so many lapses that occurred during the 2023 general elections.
“Yiaga will be deploying no fewer than 250 election observers in Anambra, and in addition to polling units as observers, they will be there from the commencement of the exercise to the result and posting and we will also have 22 mobile observers, every local government will have one mobile observer who will be roving to observe critical incidents and the others.
“Our deployment for Anambra will be using the process of result verification for transparency and it uses statistics and results to sample polling units and observe the process at the polling units and verify if the result announced by INEC is a true reflection of the votes cast at the polling unit.
“So, we will be focusing on the process and after INEC has announced result, we will give out our own result statement.
“If INEC results fall within our statement, then we can verify, but if it does not, we will highlight where the issues are and why we are not verifying that.
“Our observers will be doing what is called ‘pre-election’ and this period we are also doing stakeholders engagement and voter education, so most of our observers are like volunteers, they will be doing voter education in their community.”
On the deployment of local security vigilante known as Agunechemba during the by-elections, Mbamalu said Yiaga wants an atmosphere where voters will not be vulnerable, noting that police is the statutory security body in charge of elections.
She also lamented that the last governorship election in the recorded about 12 per cent turnout, adding that the meeting aimed to discuss how voter turnout can increased in the November poll.
“As a civil society organisation, we operate by the law, and when it comes to elections, the Nigeria Police is the security agency in charge of election security. And for Anambra, our proposal is that the security should be the police because that is the institution that is responsible for elections and you know police do not work alone, they also work with sister agencies established by federal legislation.
“That is key to ensure there is no contradiction, and to ensure that citizens do not feel threatened to participate in the process, we know that some security agencies are set up to complement security.
“For instance, in Anambra, we know there is Udo-ga-chi and Agunechemba, which were set up for security, but for elections, we don’t need them.
“We need Anambra community that is devoid of fear and intimidation on the day of the election. We need to have important conversations like ensuring that the security agencies are adequately trained before they are allowed to carry gun,” She added.
