The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has explained why it won’t be able to expand the voter registration drive nationwide.
The extension of the voter registration drive will have an impact on the preparations for the 2023 general elections, according to Akwa Ibom State Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) Mike Igini, who was speaking during an appearance on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily on Friday, August 5.
Igini said; “Now that we have officially suspended the CVR process, we have to consolidate; aggregate the data and thereafter run the biometric accreditation system to weed out all multiple registrants.
“Thereafter, Section 19 [Electoral Act 2022] says we must do a one-week display of the voter register for the commission to accept claims; objections as it relates to either omitted names or names of individuals that ought not to be on that register as identified by people in the area.
“And how do you do that? You have to produce the preliminary register of voters for this purpose which means they have to be millions of these would-be voters. That will be posted in the entire wards and local governments of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and that is a huge work.”
Igini noted that Section 17 of the Electoral Act merely requires the Commission to cease voter registration less than and not exactly 90 days to the election, noting that the electoral umpire will produce and distribute the Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) to the new registrants.
In addition, he added, “INEC will be doing more than just this.” Despite the uproar that followed the suspension of the registration, Igini said that Nigerians should be more worried about voter turnout in the next election.
“What gives spice to the practice of democracy is mass participation,” the INEC official said. The INEC REC expressed satisfaction with the recent wave of enthusiasm by Nigerians in the electoral process, likening it to what happened in the country in the lead-up to the 1993 poll.
