Professor Mahmood Yakubu, the Chairman of the Independent National
Electoral Commission (INEC), has extended the collection of Permanent
Voters Cards, PVCs to February 11, 2019, warning eligible voters that
there would be no further extension.
He stated this on Friday, when he met Resident Electoral Commissioners
(RECs) at the conference room of the INEC headquarters in Abuja.
Monday Udoh Tom, the new REC for Bayelsa State, was also welcomed to the
meeting, as it was his first time attending the meeting of RECs.
According to Yakubu, the meeting is for a final review of preparations for
the elections, just as he noted that the commission is ready for the
elections.
He said: “The collection of PVCs scheduled to end today Friday 8th
February 2019 is hereby extended nationwide to Monday 11th February 2019.
This will include Saturday and Sunday. The collection of PVCs will now
take place from 9am to 6pm daily.
“All state offices are hereby directed to review the procedure for the
collection of PVCs and dedicate all the staff of the Local Government
offices to the collection process. Staff are enjoined to be civil in
attending to citizens and to escalate issues that they cannot immediately
resolve to their superiors.
“The Commission wishes to reassure Nigerians that we will continue to take
every necessary step to ensure that no registered voter is disenfranchised
on account of non-collection of PVCs. Similarly, the Commission is taking
urgent steps to address complaints of unavailability of the PVCs of some
registered voters before the end the deadline for the collection.
“We wish to reiterate that after the deadline of Monday 11th February
2019, all uncollected PVCs will be recalled and deposited with the Central
Bank of Nigeria (CBN) for safe-keeping until after the General Elections
when the collection of cards and the continuous registration of voters
will resume.”