SHIFT DEADLINE FOR VOTER REGISTRATION, ATIKU GROUP URGES FG, INEC

 

The Atiku Diaspora Support Group, ADSG, has called on the Federal Government and the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, not to stop the Continuous Voter Registration, CVR, on the proposed August 17, to allow more Nigerians the opportunity to register and vote in the 2019 elections. 

 

The appeal was contained in a statement by the Director General and Coordinator of the Group, Mr Olumuyiwa Owadara while urging INEC to continue the registration exercise till 60 days to the February 16th, 2019 elections.

 

He complained that the exercise had been fraught with a lot of constraints thus making it hard for many people to register and get their Permanent Voter Card, PVC. 

 

Owadara who stated that the manufactured August 17th deadline by INEC was a ploy to further frustrate and disenfranchise Nigerians in the coming elections, said many Nigerians have narrated the torture they are made to go  through to enable them perform their fundamental civic right– the right to vote, with pictorial and video evidences.

 

He explained that the list of complaints include:

 

• Late-coming of officials to registration centres

• Early shutting of registration centres 

• Demand for bribes by officials before registering citizens

• Low and poor awareness especially on centres of registration

• Painfully slow registration process

• Mysteriously incomplete tools and resources to correctly register citizens

• Registration of people brought in by politicians among many others. 

 

Owadara said, with all these complaints, "being denied the basic right to vote in the next election due to the inadequacies of the Electoral Commission is an obstruction of democracy, an act the Atiku Diaspora Support Group, ADSG, wholly frowns at".

 

"As we continue to mobillise our people home and abroad, we hereby call on INEC to redress these injustices and allow our people the franchise to vote, by shifting the deadline to 60 days before the elections".