The Independent National Electoral Commission has said 889,308 Permanent Voters Cards in Bayelsa State and 1,485,828 in Kogi have been collected as at September 30.
The INEC chairman, Mahmood Yakubu, disclosed this, on Wednesday, during a quarterly meeting with media and Civil Society Organisations held at the commission’s headquarters in Abuja.
Yakubu also said the number of uncollected voters cards in Bayelsa stood at 33,874 and for Kogi, 160,522.
He noted the figures will be made available at the commission’s stakeholders’ meetings in Yenagoa and Lokoja and also uploaded on the commission’s website.
He said the commission will make available detailed figures of PVCs collected in each state by LGA as part of its effort in deepening transparency and accountability.
”For the governorship election, Bayelsa State has 8 Local Government Areas (LGAs), 105 Registration Areas (RAs), 1,804 Polling Units (PUs) and 923,182 registered voters of which 498,790 (54.3%) are male while 424,392 (45.97%) are female.
”The number of PVCs collected across the State as at 30th September 2019 is 889,308 (96.3%) with 33,874 (3.7%) uncollected. Kogi State, on the other hand, has 21 LGAs, 239 RAs, 2,548 PUs while the number of registered voters is 1,646,350 of which 825,663 (50.1%) are male and 820,687 (49.9%) are female. The number of PVCs collected is 1,485,828 (90.2%) leaving 160,522 (9.8%) uncollected.
”All uncollected PVCs have been retrieved from our LGA offices and will be deposited at the branches of the Central Bank of Nigeria in Bayelsa and Kogi States for safekeeping pending the resumption of Continuous Voter Registration (CVR).”
Meanwhile, the INEC chairman said the commission would accredit media organisations to report from the two states.
Yakubu, however, appealed to the media to be objective and professional while reporting the elections.
”Let me also appeal to the media for accurate, objective and professional reporting of the elections. INEC does not believe in censorship,
”It is our collective responsibility to combat fake news. The best antidote to fake news is more openness and transparency. We are open to verification of information either through our state offices or the national headquarters of the commission.”
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