Stay away from polling units if you don’t have PVC – INEC

Nigerians without Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) have been urged by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to avoid the polling places on election day.

Festus Okoye, the national commissioner for INEC, made this statement on Thursday in Abuja while accepting IT equipment for the INEC Citizens Contact Center (ICCC) from Community Living Project (CLP) and the Ford Foundation.

The PVC will be the only form of identity accepted on election day, according to Mr. Okoye, Chairman of the Information and Voter Education Committee.

“As Nigerians head to the polls on election day, we want to draw attention to the Electoral Act’s requirement that everyone who wishes to vote in the upcoming election have a PVC.

Section 47 subsection 1 of the Election Act makes it an obligation.

So, those without PVC are not required to go to any of our voting places.

“No person is allowed to visit the polling places and present any other form of identification besides the PVC.

He stressed once more that INEC was committed to using the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) to accredit voters and upload election results to its Result Viewing Portal (IReV).

Mr. Okoye also emphasized that only INEC has the legal authority to make election results public to the media, election observer organizations, and voters.

The terms of the agreement or the law prohibit any media organization, person, citizen, or domestic or international election observer from announcing election results.

“As some of you are aware, the Chairman of INEC serves as the returning officer for the presidential election as well as the electoral commissioner for the entire federation.

Hence, the Electoral Act and the Constitution only allow the chairman of the panel to declare the presidential election results.

To declare any other level of election, “any other individual can be nominated by the commission,” he stated.

(NAN)