Breaking News: 72.8m Nigerians collected PVCs, says INEC

Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Professor Mahmood Yakubu, has announced that the total number of Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) collected ahead of the 2019 general election stood at 72.8 million.

Yakubu made the announcement on during Thursday’s edition of the Commission’s daily media briefing on its preparedness for the rescheduled elections.

“At yesterday’s briefing, we promised to make public details of Permanent Voter Card (PVC) collection nationwide”.

“The commission has operated under the policy that no citizen can vote without the PVC issued by the commission and read by the smart card reader. Having announced the total number of registered voters and their distribution by age, gender and occupation, citizens deserve the right to know how many PVCs have been collected across the country.

“The last date for the collection of PVCs was Monday 11th February 2019. Out of the 84,000,484 registered voters, the total number of PVCs collected stands at 72,775,585, which represents 86.3% of the total PVCs produced. Detailed breakdown and percentages of collection on state-by-state basis have been published on our website few minutes ago.”

Yakubu also announced that total 11,228,582 PVCs, representing 13.7%, are uncollected.

“Out of this figure, 7,817,905 PVCs were carried over from the 2014 to 2016 registration exercises, while 3,410,677 are from the last Continuous Voter Registration (CVR) exercise held between April 2017 and August 2018,” he added.