Six months to the 2019 general elections, a total of 7, 458,291 Permanent Voter’s Cards (PVCs) are yet to be collected from the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
A consolidated PVC collection as at August 15, 2018 showed that Lagos states has the highest number of unclaimed PVCs with 1,380,142.
Lagos was followed by Oyo with 621,437; Edo 443,705; Osun 410,832; Ogun 408,403; Imo 370,202; Ondo 360,863; Federal Capital Territory (FCT) 256,069; Kogi 246,897; Kwara 232,783; Rivers 228,911, and Ekiti with 220,573 uncollected PVCs.
States with the least number of unclaimed PVCs are Taraba 2,666; Bauchi 15,474; Zamfara 19,095; Bayelsa 23,604; Plateau 24,564; Jigawa 41,379; Gombe 45,105; Ebonyi 51,896; Katsina 51,930; Kebbi 52,747; Yobe 83,732; and Borno 84,560.
States in the middle of the figures for the unclaimed PVCs are Kano, which is the 13th position with 193, 306. Kano State is followed by Benue 181,101; Kaduna 170,591; Enugu 156,352; Delta 146,508; Cross River 136,098; Niger 135,068; Abia 127,837; Akwa Ibom 124,278; Sokoto 123,094; Nasarawa 98,300; Adamawa 91,671; and Anambra 91,260.
The figures, however, showed an improvement in the number of PVCs collected between 2017 and the second Quarter of 2018.
In the first quarter of 2018, 121, 097 PVCs were collected, while a total of 461, 838 PVCs were collected in the second quarter of 2018, making the consolidated collection figure this year to reach 813, 110.
Going by the figures on the collection between the first and second quarter of 2018, Rivers State recorded 158,178.
Rivers is followed by Anambra with 108, 777; Taraba 44,886; Kogi 44,026; Oyo 41,616; Lagos 41,250; Abia 40,879; Zamfara 35,917; Ogun 26,415; Cross River 19,508, Edo 17,438; Delta 17, 182; Imo 16,886; Ondo 16,239; Enugu 15,774; FCT 15,827; Ebonyi 14,898; and Katsina 12,641.
The States with least collection figures are Bauchi 626; Niger 1,336; Plateau 2,190; Akwa Ibom 2,495, and Borno 2,640.
When contacted about the procedures to obtain the PVCs, Mr Rotimi Lawrence Oyekanmi, the Chief Press Secretary (CPS) to the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, said the presentation of the temporary voter’s card (TVC) was necessary.
“When you register, they give you a TVC, which is temporary voter’s card. When you want to collect your permanent voter’s card (PVC), you take the TVC along. They just look for your name and you submit your TVC. Then you collect your PVC. The process is as simple as that,” said Oyekanmi.
Daily Trust reports that the figures have largely remained the same with those earlier released by the electoral body in April this year.
Meanwhile, INEC says the number of new registration as of August 15, 2018 stands at 12,682,792.
The electoral body, in a statistics released on its twitter handle, said the number of Transfer Requests received was 640,706, while those asking for PVC Replacement Requests stood at 998,993.
The gender analysis of new registrants showed that number of males at 6,850,558, while females were 5,832,234.
