Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof Mahmood Yakubu, yesterday disclosed that 87.2 million Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) have so far been collected ahead of the upcoming general elections.
The INEC chairman said this at the maiden briefing for the 2023 elections in Abuja.
A breakdown of the figure showed that Lagos leads in the number of collected PVCs with 6,214,970. This is closely followed by Kano with 5,594,193, and Kaduna with 4,164, 473.
Yakubu said the current voter register has over 93.4 million voters, adding that the Commission will continue to clean it up with technology going forward.
He noted that 93.3 percent have collected their PVCs while 6,259,229 cards — which is 6.7 percent of PVCs were still uncollected.
On its verified Twitter: INEC Nigeria (@inecnigeria) February 23, 2023, the commission posted, “2 days to go! Summary of the Registered Voters ahead of the #NigeriaDecides2023 election; Number of Collected PVCs = 87,209,007; Number of Uncollected PVCs = 6,259,229 collected pic.twitter.com/73r3OcpYPR”
However, at the briefing, the INEC chairman further revealed that a total of 1,642,385 polling units and collation centre agents of political parties will participate in the elections.
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“At this juncture, it will not be inappropriate to comment on the national register voters. With 93.4 million records with names, addresses, passport photographs, and biometrics (fingerprint and facial), it is the largest data base of citizens in Africa and one of the largest in the world.
“However, like all databases, it may not be perfect but the core of the register is solid. Going forward, the Commission will continue to clean it using technology and citizens’ involvement as provided by law.
“Through the Automated Biometric Identification System (ABIS), millions of ineligible registrants have been removed from the register. In addition, citizens have helped to clean up the register further during the display of the hardcopy for claims and objections in the 8,809 Registration Areas/Wards and 774 Local Government Areas nationwide for two weeks (12th- 25th November 2022) as provided by law.
“Nigerians should therefore continue to have confidence in the register as a national treasure and work with the Commission to continuously improve on it as provided by law.
“This election is a huge logistical deployment. We have painstakingly procured, organised, and delivered all the materials to the States for deployment. We commenced the delivery of non-sensitive materials over two months ago and they have been batched down to Registration Area/Ward and Pulling Unit levels.
“Sensitive materials have been delivered to the States and are presently being delivered to our Local Government Area offices.
“As such, these materials are only between one and two levels away from the Polling Units. We have achieved this by learning from our recent difficult experience with logistics. We have completed arrangements with the transport unions for the final leg of the movement of personnel and materials to the Polling Units. They have assured us of their readiness to provide all the vehicular needs of the Commission for the election,” he said.
He also disclosed that the Commission has fully recovered from the recent attacks on her facilities in some states.
He raised concerns about vote buying but was hopeful that the vices will be dealt with. He stated that voters are not allowed to go to the voting cubicle with their phones.
Noting that all materials have been distributed to states, he said the sensitive materials are currently being delivered to local government areas. He said that non-sensitive materials were deployed two months ago.
The INEC chairman reiterated that 240 polling units do not have voters, also saying that staff to be deployed for the elections have been trained.
He assured that the commission will closely monitor the conduct of staff and will sanction anyone who compromises the process.
The INCE boss also expressed that the Commission is satisfied with the performance of the BVAS after the conduct of a mock accreditation exercise a few weeks earlier. He said that backup technicians for the BVAS have also been deployed for the election.
Yakubu said the daily briefing is to update stakeholders as events unfold ahead of and during the election.
