Nigeria’s governing party, the All Progressives Congress, APC has asked the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC to reveal to the nation, the total number of Permanent Voters Cards, PVCs Collected.
The APC Presidential Campaign Council Director of Election Planning and Monitoring, Babatunde Fashola who is also Nigeria’s Minister of Works and Housing made the request at a press briefing at the Presidential Campaign Headquarters in Abuja.
While explaining that the information on the number of PVCs collected was important for the party’s planning, Mr. Fashola urged the electoral commission to release the data in the next 24 hours.
“We are in the homestretch of the election and we think it is important now that INEC, the regulator to let us know – all the parties and the nation, to let us know how many people actually collected Permanent Voter Cards, PVCs.
“I think is very important for the credibility of the results and the credibility of the elections .
“We have been acquainted with how many people registered, but we don’t have the numbers of how many people collected PVCs and that is a very important ask.
“And I think I speak the minds of all the parties by saying. How many people collected PVCs, the breakdown of the PVCs collection per state and per local government and to every unit of electoral activity that INEC can provide that information” the Minister said.
Recall that the collection of the Permanent Voters Card ended on 5th February this year.
Also, from recent information released by the electoral commission 4,175,006 people were not able to collect their Voters Cards in 10 states before the deadline.
While explaining the level of preparedness of the party for the election, he said they have trained their agents in all the states and that they are ready to do their duties regardless of the naira scarcity currently affecting the nation.
“We’ve trained our agents, we started that process long before this development (naira swap) became a real problem. But the enthusiasm from our agents and from our supporters is very inspiring and as it is comforting. What we hear from them is whether they get money, whether they get fuel, they are going to work for APC, they are going to deliver Asiwaju and all our candidates and other matters of money will be resolved later,” he said.
The Minister said that the party’s situation room was up and running to monitor the election process.
Mr. Fashola added that the Campaign Directorate on Election Planning and Monitoring has been liaising with the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC as well as civil society organizations.
Confidence Okwuchi
