The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) says it has suspended the Continuous Voter Registration (CVR) in Kwara for one week.
The INEC Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) in Kwara, Malam Garuba Madami, made this known in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Friday in Ilorin.
Madami said the suspension would last till Thursday (Sept. 30) to allow for claims and objections that may arise from the preliminary voters register.
He added that the claims and objections would take place at the INEC offices in the 16 local government areas of the state.
The REC said that at the close of the exercise on Thursday, a total of 32,790 people were registered as voters in the state since the exercise began in July.
These figures, Madami said, were made up of 15,429 males and 17,361 females.
According to him, Kwara is in the 11th position of the states with highest number of registered voters in the first quarter among the 36 states and the FCT.
The REC expressed satisfaction at the position of Kwara on the registration table, but added that it can be better.
He therefore called on politicians to mobilise their members to register as voters.
“It is the political parties that should mobilise the supporters to register as voters.
“It is the political parties that would benefit from such registration, so they should sensitise their supporters to register.
“Therefore, mobilisation of voters should be a joint effort of political parties and INEC.
“Political parties jettison this assignment and it’s left to Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
“The number of Permanent Voters Card (PVC) collected is the number of votes that can be casted during election,” he explained.
He however said that the commission would embark on aggressive and sustained publicity from September to create awareness for the people to register as voters.
Madami said that the second quarter of the CVR exercise would run from Sept. 24 to Dec. 30, 2021, while the exercise would end on July 11, 2022.
The REC warned the people of the state against double registration as this constituted electoral offence punishable under the Electoral Act.
According to him, his target is to increase the number of registered voters in Kwara from 1,376,372 to 3.5 million at the end of the exercise in July 2022.
NAN reports that any Nigerian that has attained 18 years of age is eligible to register as voter.
Madami also said that registered voters who had issues with accreditation during the last exercise can register as well as voters who want to transfer their PVCs to another location and those with wrongly spelt names. (NAN)
