The management of Daar Communications, owners of African Independent Television (AIT), has alleged that supporters of Muhammadu Buhari, presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), rigged its online presidential poll.
AIT had pulled the poll from its website on Tuesday when the APC candidate led President Goodluck Jonathan 77% to 21%, with insinuations that the network was embarrassed by Buhari’s massive lead.
In a statement released on Thursday, the station’s management said the sudden jump in Buhari’s scores alerted the technical team into shutting down the poll and conducting an integrity test.
It said: “Suspicions that the poll was compromised where (were) first muted when it emerged the number of unique IP addresses was significantly less than the number of votes polled. This suggested that some pollers were able to vote multiple times.
“A forensic test of the votes polled after the website was shut down further revealed that 30 identified unique IP-addresses had voted a total of 4969 times in favour of General Mohammed (Muhammadu) Buhari.
“Furthermore a software application that incrementally changes the IP-addresses was discovered to be used in the voting process in favour of General Mohammed Buhari and the APC political party. Daar Communications Plc is presently seeking legal advise amid privacy concerns about releasing the raw CSV files on its www.aitonline.tv website for interested Nigerians to independently verify the integrity of the online poll.
“The management of Daar Communications Plc determined this afternoon to make this information publicly available to protect its integrity amid accusations of bias promoted in some websites as well as on social media. The management further stated that ait remains committed to providing transparent bipartisan coverage of local and international news within the confines of best practice. The media and members of the public shall be updated as more information becomes available.”
