MEMBERS of the House of Representatives could not vote Tuesday on clause by clause basis on constitutional amendment due to technical hitches on the use of the electronic voting device.
The original electronic voting device installed on the floor of House could not function, after it was put to use in the last constitutional amendment exercise of 2010 during the 6th Assembly.
Efforts by NIGCOMSAT's technical team, led by its Director General, Dr Ahmed Rufai to improvise through the use of an Ipad yielded results but it came so late in the day, a development that prompted the Speaker of the House, Aminu Waziri Tambuwal to adjourn proceedings on the issue till Wednesday.
Tambuwal, who acknowledged that Nigerians are anxiously waiting for the outcome of the exercise in the House of Representatives, justified the adjournment, saying it was aimed at enabling the members of the House to get used to the Ipad before the start of the voting procedure.
Rufai corroborated the speaker's position, saying the Ipad devise needs to be charged to be able to go through the rigours of the voting process that could last for over three hours.
The lawmakers, who were initially billed to commence the voting process at 10 a.m. spent over four hours behind closed doors battling to put to use the 360 pieces of Ipad fitted with the requisite software for the electronic voting procedure.
This is the third time there is a shift in the vote on the constitutional amendment on the floor of the House of Representatives. First, it was due to the inability of the lawmakers to agree on the mode to adopt in the voting process and then due to limited copies of the text of items to be amended at the disposal of the lawmakers and secondly, the sudden death of Senator Pius Ewherido, which led to the suspension of the session in his honour.
The Guardian
Technical hitches is not something that should be happening too often cos it remians a very bad thing. We should improve on it!