By Abiodun Esan —
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has expressed worry over the low turnout of voters during elections in the country.
INEC National Commissioner for North Central, Malam Mohammed Haruna, said this in Ilorin on Tuesday during an interactive session with religious leaders in the state ahead of the Feb. 16, and March 2, general elections.
He therefore charged religious leaders to talk to their followers on the need to come out en-mass to vote during the coming elections.
“One cause of concern is our low turnout. For instance, the Kogi Governorship Election in November 2015 was 36 per cent.
“Bayelsa was 35 per cent, Edo 32 per cent, Ondo 35 per cent; Anambra was 21 per cent; Ekiti 44. 2 per cent and Osun was 42.6 per cent.
He said the worst turnout of voters for election was recorded at Eti-osa Federal Constituency in Lagos, where less than three per cent of registered voters turned up to vote.
The National Commissioner told the religious leaders that a total of 13, 366, 270 voters were registered in the North Central zone by INEC to vote during the coming elections.
He said Kwara State had the lowest number of voters with 1, 406, 437, followed by Kogi with 1, 646, 350 and Benue with 2, 480, 131 voters.
Haruna added that Plateau State had the highest number of voters in the zone with 2, 480, 455 voters followed by Niger with 2, 390, 035 voters while Nasarawa registered 1, 617, 786 electorate.
The Commissioner said that men accounted for 52. 86 per cent of the total number of registered voters in the country while 47. 14 per cent of the voters were women.
According to him, youths between the ages of 18 to 35 years formed the bulk of voters with 51. 11 per cent of the total registered voters, followed by middle age voters of 36 to 50 years accounting for 29.97 per cent.
He said 15. 22 per cent of the registered voters were voters from 51 to 70 years of age while voters of 70 years and above accounted for 3. 69 per cent.
Haruna told the religious leaders that INEC had put in place a machinery to curb vote buying at the polling units by altering their configuration.
According to him, the ballot boxes would be moved closer to the voting cubicles in order to make it difficult for voters to expose their marked ballot papers.
“We have introduced partial ban on the use of mobile phones and other photographic devices by voters while in the voting cubicles.
“Thirdly, we are introducing rolling and flattening of ballot papers by voters before casting them into the ballot boxes,” he added.
The National Commissioner told the religious leaders that the Commission had identified a new method of vote buying by politicians.
“We have received credible information that some partisan actors are now going around buying up PVCs from voters or financially inducing them to collect the Voter Identification Numbers (VIN) on their PVCs.
“In some instances, telephone numbers and details of bank accounts of voters have been collected,” Haruna told the religious leaders.
He added that by collecting the PVCs, the intention of politicians was to deprive the voters of voting since no one could vote without the PVC.
“By collecting their phone numbers and bank details, the intention is to induce voters by electronic transfer of funds to their account since it will be difficult to buy votes at polling units.
“By collecting the VINs, they may be acting on the notion that our system can be hacked into and Card Readers somehow preloaded ahead of election compromised,” he said.
Haruna therefore assured Nigerians that INEC was aware of the new tricks, describing it as a futile effort.
“We will work with the security agencies to deal with violators of our electoral laws including those who may be trying to compromise our staff who distribute PVCs to legitimate voters,” he said.
The Commissioner appealed to the religious leaders to enlighten their followers on the various aspects of the elections.
“These include the voting procedures, the importance of voting, mobilisation of voters, especially women, youths and people living with disability,” Haruna said. (NAN)
