Over 14,000 PVCs snatched by hoodlums in Rivers

FROM TONY JOHN, PORT HARCOURT

The Independent National Elec­toral Commis­sion (INEC) has declared that over 14,000 Permanent Voters’ Cards have been snatched from officials of the Commis­sion by hoodlums in Rivers State.

Resident Electoral Com­missioner (REC), Mrs. Ge­sila Khan, disclosed this yes­terday, to journalists in Port Harcourt.

According to her, some of the cards were stolen from local government collection centres, where the PVCs were deposited to enable the rightful owners have free ac­cess to them at the close of the collection exercise by INEC.

Also, Khan stated that over 50,000 PVCs would be distributed to the right­ful owners in two weeks before the general election, noting that over 80 per cent of the registered voters in the state had collected their PVCs.

Speaking further, the INEC resident told the news­men that her office had re­ceived 2,990,056 PVCs and distributed 1,869,379.

The REC, who expressed dismay at the action of the hoodlums, expressed dismay that State recorded one of the highest cases of stolen PVCs in the country.

“I am appealing to Rivers people because we have lost a lot of cards. We have lost more than 14,000 PVCs and it is one of the highest figures in the federation.

“All the cards that were snatched are useless and meaningless because we are going to use a new sys­tem called card readers. Your card readers are just like ATM cards. You take it there and they slot it into the card reader to confirm if it is yours before you are allowed to vote”.

Khan emphasised: “So, if you go there with another person’s voter’s card, it is meaningless. So, I am advis­ing those with other peoples’ cards to return them to the local government offices so that the rightful owners can collect them, so that they can participate in the general election.

“Polling officer will on the presentation of the PVC by an electorate be slotted into the card reader to confirm if it belongs to you. The next stage is the confirmation of your finger prints by the card reader before you are allowed to vote. If you go to the polling booth with some­one else’s voters’ card, you would not be able to vote be­cause each card is unique and can only be authenticated by the real owner. The PVCs are meaningless to those who have stolen them”.

He stressed: “The PVCs are beyond registration; the cards are beyond voting. People now use these cards in the banks as a means of identifying themselves. All those who snatched these cards should please take them to the designated col­lection centres so that we can give them to the rightful owners so that the rightful owners can use them dur­ing the elections to perform their legitimate civic du­ties”.

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