2.3 million voters registered in Kano

No fewer than 2, 315, 956 eligible voters were registered for the 2019 general election in Borno, according to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on Wednesday.

Muhammad Ibrahim, the State Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) said that the figure was the cumulative voters registered as at end of December 2018.

He said that Continuous Voter Registration (CRV) was conducted between April 2017 and December 2018 as part of comprehensive preparations for the 2019 general elections.

The REC said that over 504, 000 voters were captured in the exercise, adding that the exercise captured new registered voters, replacement of cards and those on transfer.

Elaborating on the Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) collection exercise, Ibrahim explained that 278, 497 of the 504, 000 cards were collected as at February 4, representing over 70 per cent.

He, however, expressed optimism that the remaining cards would be collected before the end of the exercise.

The REC said that the commission had engaged community and religious leaders to create awareness and promote participation in the exercise.

“There was low turnout at the beginning of the exercise due to poor attitude of the people, but we have recorded upsurge in participation and collection of the card in the past few days.

“We are hoping that the remaining cards will be collected before the end of the exercise,” he said, adding that the commission had designated 5, 071 Voting Points (VPs) and 3, 933 Polling Units (PUs) in the state to ease the collection.

On the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), Ibrahim said that 409, 833 displaced persons were registered by the commission and had developed frame work and guidelines to enable them exercise their franchise.

Ibrahim said that the displaced persons were categorised into intra-state and inter-state IDPs, noting that the former would vote in all the elections, while the latter vote only in the presidential election.

He said that IDPs from eight local government areas of the state would vote in various camps located in Maiduguri and other communities.

The commissioner listed the affected councils to include Abadam, Guzamala, Marte, Dikwa, Ngala, Kukawa, Mobbar and Kala Balge.

“Effective arrangements have been put in place for inter-state IDPs to vote in the state of domicile so that they will not be disenfranchised.

“Smart Card Reader in IDPs camp will be configured to the Registration Area (RA) level.

“Registration Area is different from the Polling Unit (PU). In PU, you can go further, it is the last point of voting, but if there is insecurity, you stop at RA”.