INEC laments poor PVC collection in Adamawa

Adamawa State office of the National Independent Electoral Commission has lamented the poor pace of collection of outstanding Permanent Voter Cards by the electorate in the state.

The newly-deployed Resident Electoral Commissioner in the state, Hudu Yunusa, expressed the concern at a news conference at the premises of the commission in Yola, on Friday.

He said over 200,000 PVCs, registered since 2019, were lying idle in the offices of the commission across the 21 local government areas.

He said 36,000 additional voters had been registered during the 2022 voter registration.

“Some of the voter cards are yet to be collected by their original enrollees.”

He appealed to the media and the stakeholders to continue to sensitive the electorate to the imperative of the voter cards, stressing the card qualified one as an eligible voter.

The REC explained that the commission received delivery of 4,104 Bimodal Voter Accreditation System and the Result Viewing Portal for deployment to 4,104 polling units for the elections.

He said the state would host a week-long Northeast zonal Technology Training in elections in batches, saying the participants were drawn from Adamawa, Borno, Yobe, Gombe, Bauchi and Taraba states.

Yunusa appealed to politicians and political parties to conduct themselves with decency, discipline and decorum during their campaigns, stressing that campaigns should be issue-based.

“We call on the politicians to avoid name-dropping, provocative comments, violence, thuggery and engagement of militia,” he said.

“The Electoral Act prohibits campaigns in worship and public offices, so such attitude would not be condoned by the commission,” he added.

He said the commission had updated the staff skills through capacity-building training, seminars and workshops on election issues and processes.

According to him, the commission has so far recorded 10,000 people who applied to work as ad hoc staff out of the targeted 16,000 required temporary staff for the polls.

“The commission’s ad hoc staff recruitment portal is still active up to December 14, 2022; we, therefore, call on interested and qualified Nigerians to apply,” he said.

He said the commission would engage stakeholders on the conduct of the Internally Displaced Persons voting, saying “we would focus our attention on Madagali, Fufore and Yola South Local Government Areas.

“We are currently displaying the Preliminary Register of Voters nationwide from November 12 to 28, 2022 for claims and objections,” he disclosed.

NAN