Abiodun Onafuye/ Abeokuta

Governor Ibikunle Anosun of Ogun State in southwest,Nigeria has declared that the Independent National Electoral Commission,INEC is deliberately planning to disenfranchise residents of the State from voting by not providing their Permanent Voters’ Cards,PVC’s.

Amosun accused the Commission of bringing 625,000 cards that are not meant for the people of the State. He also accused the commission of not being serious about the release of cards to voters that registered anew in November.

The governor spoke with newsmen Wednesday evening at the office of the INEC in Abeokuta after over four hours meeting with the Resident Electoral Commissioner, Chief Timothy Ibitoye.

Governor Amosun said that that as at today, 639, 000 voters in the State have received Permanent Voters’ Cards out of the expected 1.8million.

The collection rate stands at 40 percent.

Amosun said he ahd petitioned INEC on the ghost 625,000 voters’ cards, but nothing has been done, making the governor suspect that some unidentified people are bet on disenfranchising voters in the state.

According to him,”if you have been following what has been happening to the issue of general election of 2015, it has been postponed for two reasons which are security and to give INEC enough time to sort themselves out.

“As at today,Ogun State just collected 40% voter cards. I have been interfacing with INEC,I wrote letter to the INEC Chairman on December 19,2014, enumerating all what is happening in the State. I have been here since morning, they don’t have good story to tell us.

“What I can understand now is that somebody somewhere does not want us to vote in Ogun State. In 2011,1.8million voted in Ogun State,after the election, they reduced 500,000,we now have 1.3million. Their excuses was that some are multiple registers and so on. The new registration in the State is about 400,000,if we add it up with the number before,we will be having like 1.7- 1.8million. The cards they brought originally in November 2014 were about 1.1million,about 600,000 of those cards don’t belong to Ogun State,which means, somebody don’t want us to vote in Ogun State.

“When the National Commissioner,Prof. Lai Olorode came here,I told him,he did nothing to it,we wrote letter,nothing came out from that. From Monday now,our people will be resuming here to ensure that things are done the ways it ought to be. This is a deliberate attempt to disenfranchise us in the State,”Amosun stated.
The governor who visibly expressed anger about the whole issue advised the Commission to compare the 2011 registers with what they have now,saying that the truth will be revealed.

He called on the Commission to release the voters’ cards of the newly registered residents last November, which was said to be 440,000.

“The new registration the Commission did in Ogun State was over 440,000 and as at today,they have just brought only 159,000 while something around 280,000 are still expected. Why are they bringing our cards in pieces and other States are receiving their own in bulk? It is our cards,they will bring like 30,000 or 18,000 and a times 10,000, all these have been collected by the owners. They even removed names from our list,about 30,000 from Ijebu Ode, 13,000 from Ado Odo/Ota and many others. I don’t know who is doing all these in Abuja,we are appealing to them to release our cards.

“With the records with me now just handed over to me by the Commission,Abeokuta South and Abeokuta North have about 90 per cent of their cards available while Ado-Odo, Yewa South,Ijebu Ode,Imeko-Afon,Odogbolu and Sagamu have no cards on ground. How do we describe this? This is why we have not declared public holiday because we have not seen the readiness from the INEC.”