The Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, said it has registered a total of 269,992 new voters in Edo and Ondo states.
The commission’s continuous voter registration (CVR) exercise which ended on Sunday, June 9, was part of the programmes lined up for the governorship election in the two states.
Chairman, Information and Voter Education Committee Sam Olumekun, in a statement on Tuesday, disclosed that there were more registered female than male.
Olumekun who is INEC National Commissioner, stated that out of the registered figure, 129,246 (47.87 per cent) are male while 140,756 (52.13 per cent) are female.
“Still, the majority of the registered voters (182,541 or 67.61 per cent) are youths (18-34 years).
“In terms of occupation, 95,463 (or 35.36 per cent) are students while 1,588 (0.59 per cent) are persons with disability (PWDs),” he added.
The National Commissioner further disclosed that 24,454 voters requested for replacement of their permanent voter’s cards (PVCs), while 74,493 applications were received for voter transfer.
Olumekun added that “8,314 for information update were received.”
According to him, as provided in section 19 of the Electoral Act 2022, INEC will display the register for claims and objections by citizens for a period of seven days, beginning from Wednesday, June 12.
“The display will take place in all the 395 wards across the two states, adding that “The register will also be available on our website: https://cvr.inecnigeria.org/register.”
Olumekun explained that the purpose of the display is for the public to identify any ineligible persons on the register, “draw the commission’s attention to it and file an objection to the appearance of the name on the register by completing Forms EC2 and EC3 available from our officials in all the centres.
“The Forms can also be downloaded from our website – https://inecnigeria.org/?page_id=13655 – and handed over to our officials as provided in Section 9(4) of the Electoral Act 2022.
“Furthermore, fresh registrants and applicants for transfer, correction of personal details and replacement of lost or damaged PVCs can draw the commission’s attention to errors or wrong entries for further action.”
He added that at the end of the period for claims and objections, INEC will further clean up the register using the Automated Biometric Identification System (ABIS) before the list of new voters is added to the existing register for the two states.
Olumekun maintained that these are preliminary figures, as “The final figures will be published on state by state basis after the period for claims/objections and ABIS.
“The date for the commencement of collection of new PVCs will be announced thereafter.”
He appealed to the public to seize the opportunity of the display of the register to help clean it up as provided by law.
