INEC to resume voter registration June 28

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) says it plans to resume nationwide Continuous Voters Registration (CVR) on April 28 to allow eligible voters register, ahead of 2023 poll.

INEC Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) in Kwara, Malam Garba Attahiru-Madami made this known when he spoke with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Tuesday in Ilorin.

He said those eligible to register as voters were Nigerians who attained the age of 18 and have not been registered before.

Attahiru-Madami said others included registered voters who wished to transfer their voting units to other locations, as well as voters whose Permanent Voters Cards (PVC) were damaged.

He said that voters who had their names wrongly spelt would be eligible to register to correct the error.

“The CVR will close at the end of third quarter of 2022,” Attahiru-Madami said.

The REC said as a build up to 2023 general elections, INEC would embark on field work in the 16 Local Government Areas (LGAs) of the state to assess the polling units.

He said the action was with the view expanding polling points to polling units to make them accessible to the people.

Attahiru-Madami said INEC was determined to address the problem of voter apathy by making polling units accessible to voters.

He said that since 1999 general elections, Nigeria has only recorded 35 per cent of voters’ participation, adding that Ghana recorded over 55 per cent in its last election.

According to him, INEC is ready to remove hindrances that bring apathy so as to record appreciable percentage of voters during election.

He listed such hindrances to include voters traveling long distance to polling units, inaccessible polling units, communal disputes and population growth.

Attahiru-Madami said Nigeria’s voters population has increased from 53 million in 1999 to 85 million in 2019 while polling units remained at 119, 973 since 1996.

“Over the years, INEC has faced several challenges with regard to polling units as a result of population growth, expansion of towns and villages, demographic shift and growth of new settlements,” he said.