Ahead of the forthcoming general elections, the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, in Ondo State has revealed that the commission has been able to identify and delete names of dead persons from the state’s voters’ register.
The Resident Electoral Commissioner, REC, Rufus Akeju, disclosed this at a press briefing in Akure, the Ondo State capital.
According to the REC, INEC had already displayed the list of registered voters across the 18 local government areas of the state.
“The total of 1,828,219 were registered in and a total of 398,958 Permanent Voters’ Cards (PVC) are yet to be collected.
“This exercise (display of register of voters) was carried out in this state in the last quarter of the year 2018.
“Quite a number of claims raised during the exercise were treated and names of dead persons that are still in the register were identified for deletion.
“The statistics of PVC distribution in the state as at January 2, 2019, is a total number of registered voters – 1,828,219 and a total of uncollected PVCs in the state are 398,958,” he stated.
Akeju further explained that a total of 41 senatorial contestants, 96 federal constituency contestants, 326 will be participating in the 2019 general elections exercise in Ondo state, adding that both the Presidential and National Assembly election and that of the State Assembly will hold in 3,007 polling units of the state on the February 16, and March 2, 2019.
He also maintained that the Smart Card Readers would be deployed for the general elections as parts of measure as identifying counterfeit PVCs as well as authenticating the genuine ones.
On the issue of vote buying, he stressed that the menace would be adequately tackled as the commission has devise means of curbing the trend.
“We are reviewing the administration of polling units to enhance secrecy of vote by locating the voting cubicle outside the glare of party agents.
“We are also enhancing the ability of visually impaired person to votes without assistance and addressing abuses in the process of assisted voting for non-literate voters who will be requesting such assistance to protect the secrecy of their vote.
“So, we shall be collaborating with security and other law enforcement agencies on monitoring, arrest and investigation and prosecution of the offenders to put and end to brazen act, especially within the vicinity of our polling units,” he stated.
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