The Minister of Science and Technology, Dr. Ogbonnaya Onu has made case for reforms of the electoral system to pave way for adoption of electronic voting saying it will help in eliminating errors caused by human factor in compiling election results.
Dr. Onu said this when he paid a facility visit to the Electronic Development Institute (ELDI) in Awka, Anambra state on Monday.
He expressed confidence that when this is done, challenges of malpractices, fraud and less credible results would be a thing of the past, adding that more Nigerians will be willing to participate further in the electoral process.
According to Dr. Onu, the nation’s democratic process will experience tremendous improvement when these reforms take place. In his words, “Democracy is like a living organism that grows like humans, animals and plants, for this to happen we need electronic voting, as this will reduce malpractices associated with human errors”.
He noted that with the level of innovative work done at the (ELDI), Nigeria will no longer need to import electronic products from abroad, but rather produced in the country to meet up local demand and the surplus will be exported, this he added will improve the nation’s GDP (Gross Domestic Product).
Onu further stated that the ministry is working with the Independent National Electoral Commission INEC to build voting machines with encouraging results.
The Minister hailed the efforts of the National Agency for Science and Engineering Infrastructure (NASENI), in building critical engineering infrastructure.
He said, “I am happy that NASENI is doing alot of work in critical areas of National Development such as Food and Security”.
“Nigeria has a population of over 200 million people, and has to be in a position to feed it’s population, adding that to achieve food security mechanized farming must be embraced”.
He enjoined investors to see farming as a lucrative business, and called for more investment in large scale farming equipment such as tractors, harvesters etc.
“ More investment in agricultural infrastructure will attract young Nigerians who will be willing to rely on machines as against human labour to carry out their farming activities”.
Oni also advised farmers to engage in Public, Private Partnerships (PPP) to successfully achieve commercialization of farm produce.
He called for protection of intellectual property (PATENTS) in the research and development of key engineering infrastructure for the benefit of researchers, engineers, scientists and the entire nation.
Earlier, the managing Director of the Institute, Dr. Patrick Okwu commended the vigour and resilience brought to Science and Technology Sector by the Minister and his team since assumption of office.
He said that the annual Science and Technology Expo has not only brought healthy competition among various research and academic institutions, but has also brought to the limelight technological capacity of Nigerians.
Okwu called for more funding to enable the Institute commercialize their recently developed inventions and innovations.
