Ekiti State Governor, Dr Kayode Fayemi; and his wife, Erelu Bisi Fayemi, displaying their Permanent Voter's Card (PVC), during the exercise, at Isan-Ekiti.
As the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) begins the distribution of Permanent Voters Cards (PVC) to eligible voters in Ekiti State, the State Governor, Dr Kayode Fayemi has to the electorate to troop out and collect their cards.
The Governor and his wife, Erelu Bisi Fayemi picked up their permanent cards at the Ogilolo polling unit 009, Isan/Ilemeso Ward 11 in Isan Ekiti on Friday at the commencement of the exercise which is being pioneered in the State by the electoral commission.
Governor Fayemi, while fielding questions from journalists on his assessment of the exercise, said it was too early to give a definitive stance since the exercise had just begun. He however said that available reports indicated that voters are being attended to in the 2195 polling units across the State.
He however stated that the reports also showed that many people have not turned up for the exercise following the fuel scarcity that has hit the country, hindering many people from travelling to their various places of registration.
Fayemi said: “I have to be very preliminary in that remarks because I haven’t received reports from all the 2195 polling units in the state. But I think things have been set up pretty well and as you have noticed with my collection, it is pretty straight forward. We just need to get our people to get out to go and collect their cards. That’s where the challenge lies.
“Since we also have a challenge with fuel in town, that is contributing to some reluctance on the part of people who may be residing in Ado but are registered in their own villages. So getting them out to do that requires a lot more efforts on the part of government and all stakeholders because we only have three days for this and we want to make sure that people collect virtually all the cards as soon as possible”, he added.
The Governor who explained that government had embarked on sensitization exercise and declared Friday as a public holiday to enable people get their cards asserted that INEC might consider extending the collection duration if their assessment shows that a sizeable number of the electorate have not collected their cards.
Fayemi said Ekiti people are desirous of exercising their civic duty as far as the June 21 governorship election is concerned and will endeavour to get their cards against all odds.
On the registration of new voters, the Governor explained that the exercise is essential given the statistical analysis that about 20 million Nigerians have turned 18 years since the last registration exercise while those who were previously not registered would do so now.
“Given the statistics analysis available to us across the country, about 20 million Nigerians are turning 18 who were not eligible the last time but are going to be eligible in this election. So you can’t just depend on what happens in this particular exercise. The next registration exercise will be coming up between the 12th and 19th March. That’s where those who were not eligible before or who were eligible but for one reason or the other were not registered will have the opportunity to register in the continuous voters registration exercise.”
“ We are confident that Ekiti people are desirous of exercising their civic duty as far as voting in the June 21 election is concerned. So a lot will come out. We have done a lot of sensitization even though this is not our job. We deliberately declared today a work- free day so that people can go out and do this, and we are also putting out adverts and jingles on radio and television to sensitize the populace to be out in their various units to collect their cards. I will like to think that INEC itself is monitoring the situation and by the end of tomorrow, it will be clear to them whether a sizeable number of people have collected their cards or not, and if they haven’t, I expect them to do the right thing to extend the collection so that we don’t run into any risk”, Fayemi opined.
Last modified: March 7, 2014
