By Olasunkanmi Akoni

TWELVE days to the conduct of February 14th, 2015, Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, has disclosed plans to release about 1.9 million Permanent Voter’s Cards, PVCs to Lagos State this week.

Resident Electoral Commissioner, REC in Lagos, Mr. Akin Orebiyi, disclosed this at the Governorship debate forum organised by Nigeria Union of Journalists, NUJ, Lagos chapter in collaboration with the Lagos State Television, LTV, Ikeja.

Orebiyi explained that of the 1.9 million, 1.3 million were for those who registered in 2014 and 600,000 are for those who registered in 2011.

He noted that the PVCs would arrive the state this week and would be available for collection in the 245 collection centres created by the electoral body.

Orebiyi added that 1.7 million PVCs were yet to be collected by residents of the state.

The REC however, lamented that larger percentage of the candidate’s supporters were yet to collect their PVCs.

However, the Chairman, Community Development Advisory Council (CDAC), Alhaji Tajudeen Quadri, has appealed to INEC, to ensure that all eligible voters in the state are able to collect their PVC ahead of the forthcoming February elections in order to give every resident the opportunity to choose a leader of    his/her choice.

According to the details of the voters’ register released by INEC, Lagos State showed the highest number of registered voters with 5,822,207 found eligible out of the 68,833,476 registered voters.

The then Resident Electoral Commissioner of INEC in the state, Dr. Adekunle Ogunmola, had on October 29th, 2014, announced that the commission was to distribute a total of 4.8 million PVCs to residents of the state.

However, INEC has disclosed that the collection of PVCs which is going on in all the electoral wards in Nigeria will end on February 8, about one week before the start of the 2015 general elections.

Confusion, complaints, anger has however, continued to trail the distribution of the PVCs as residents accused INEC officials of sabotaging the exercise by hoarding the cards.

Investigation carried out in Alimosho area which harbours the largest number of voters in the state, about 70 percent of respondents claimed they were yet to collect their PVCs.

Kunle Tijani, a barber at Car Wash area of Egbeda expressed his anger thus: “ I registered at Isheri in Egbe Idimu Local Council Development Area, LCDA,. I was directed to go to Ikotun before I was later directed to Alimosho LGA in Akonwonjo.

At Alimosho, I was directed to go to one Ebenezer School at Egbeda when I got there they could not find my card after several hours of waiting.

“As I made to leave the centre because I was told to check back the next day as INEC will deliver more PVCs, an official approached me and demanded for N2, 000 to help me locate it. I pleaded with him to help me because I only had N200 on me but he refused and went away.

“I am yet to go back because I know they will demand for bribe which I don’t have and not ready to part with. This process is corrupt. I wonder how am going to vote despite the fact that I have my Temporary Voter Card”

Another resident who simply gave her name as Mrs. Alabi was however, lucky as she managed to get her PVC after much ado. “I collected my PVC last week, but not after I parted with N1000. Its terrible,”

Also, Mr John, whose centre is at Local Government Primary School, Idimu, lamented that since two weeks he had been reporting at the centre without success as INEC officials were nowhere to be found.

“I am confused, I don’t know what to do again, as you can see (pointing to the crowd) we have been coming here and on each occasion left disappointed, no thanks to absence of INEC officials.”

Meantime, the Chairman, Community Development Advisory Council (CDAC), Alhaji Tajudeen Quadri, made the appeal at the end of a special meeting of the Council on the role of the Community Development Associations (CDAs) in ensuring a hitch free election in the communities.

Alhaji Quadri explained that his council members had been holding several meetings with the CDAs on the need for their members to obtain their PVCs in order not to be disenfranchised.

He however, noted that it was unfortunate that the response from members in various CDAs has always been that most of them are finding it difficult to collect their cards.

While noting that the distribution centres were inadequate to cater for the population of the state, he disclosed that INEC officials present at the few centres were inadequate to meet the demand of the people.

He therefore charged INEC to further decentralize the distribution centres and put additional staff to make the collection of PVC easier for the people.