By Olanrewaju Adesanya
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in Lagos State has appealed to the various political parties and stakeholders to eschew do-or-die attitude and violence at polls.
The commission during a stakeholders meeting on Tuesday held in Ikeja, also counseled them on the need to avoid mud slinging and abusive tendencies, like defacing of opposing party’s bill boards, name calling and other misdemeanours.
Cardinals of Mr. Olusegun Agbaje the Lagos Resident Electoral Commissioner’s speech was the need for more collaboration with all political parties, as regards sensitisation of eligible voters on the need to pick up their Permanent Voters Cards (PVCs) which remain uncollected till now.
Agbaje hinted that after two month it flagged off distribution of about 34,000 newly printed Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) for new registrants, only 6, 382 applicants have come for collection across the state.
According him the low rate of PVC collection across the 20 Local Government is becoming a worrisome as the turnout for the ongoing Continuous Voter Registration (CVR) was not impressive at the start, the development that put the state at fifth position nationwide in the number of new registered voters.
He said: “The low rate of PVC collection in Lagos State is worrisome as only 6,382 PVCs out of 34,242 received from the Commission’s Headquarters for the first and second quarters CVR had been collected by their owners. This is just 18.6 per cent.
“Similarly for the old PVCs, a total of 1,091,157 are still uncollected by their owners.
“In view of the foregoing, I want to strongly urge you to continue to assist the Commission in mobilising the eligible citizens residing in Lagos State that are yet to collect their PVCs to take advantage of the opportunity provided by the ongoing collection of PVCs at the INEC LGA offices where they registered to collect their PVCs as anyone without the PVC cannot vote during any election.”
INEC REC in Lagos Mr Olusegun Agbaje addressing stakeholders at parley in Ikeja on Tuesday.
The INEC boss, who hinted that the June 30 deadline for the ongoing CVR is likely to be extended, cautioned political leaders against do-or-die politics which he said had become stock in trade of some politicians who wanted to win elections by all means including violence, malpractices, thuggery and all other election vices.
Agbaje said that INEC was more worried that Lagos State was one of the most violent States during the last Primary Elections with five (5) people reportedly killed in two Local Government Areas.
“We cannot continue like this. Therefore, all hands must be on deck with the political party leaders at the forefront to make Lagos State one of the most peaceful States during electioneering campaigns and elections in 2023.
“The political class must change her “do or die” attitude to good conduct in politics by doing away with all election vices including destroying the bill boards of opponents, using vulgar languages during campaigns and using thugs to harass political opponents.
“It is important to stress that the inability of the political parties to imbibe the culture of genuine internal party democracy is unhealthy for the electoral process.
“If we must achieve our collective goal of building a durable democratic culture, political parties must embrace the culture of sincere internal party democracy while also avoiding all forms of contraventions to the extant laws,” he said.
Urging the party leaders to increase political awareness, Agbaje, who decried voter apathy, said that increased political education will no doubt increase the PVC collection rate and checkmate voter apathy that have characterized past elections in the state.
According to him, only 1,156,590 out of 6,570,291 registered voters(17.6 per cent) participated in the 2019 General Election in Lagos State while only104, 405 out of 1,343, 448 registered voters (7.8 per cent) participated in the 2020 Lagos East Senatorial District bye-Election.
Agbaje, who stressed that INEC was working assiduously round the clock towards ensuring the successful conduct of the 2023, said that the commission would continue to focus on its mandate, guided by its mission and vision.
He said: “The Commission will equally as usual, remain an unbiased umpire in dealing with all Political Parties in Lagos State. It is imperative to once more enjoin all stakeholders to play strictly by the rules as part of our collective efforts towards ensuring the successful conduct of the general election.
“It is pertinent to note that the Commission has also taken a bold step in her ongoing efforts to inject technological impetus into the electoral system and has further strengthened the voting process for the conduct of very free, fair, credible and acceptable elections by introducing the Bi-modal Voter Authentication System (BVAS).”
According to him, in Lagos State, 640,786 eligible voters has done the online registration before it ended on 30th May, 2022 but as at June 20, only 338,955 have completed their registration.
He said that the commission was making frantic efforts towards ensuring that all eligible citizens are captured before the end of the CVR.
In a chat with Mr Philip Aivoji, the Chairman, People’s Democratic Party (PDP), Lagos State, called on INEC to further decentralise the CVR exercise and PVCs distribution, saying centralisation of CVR and PVCs could disenfranchise millions of eligible voters.
Aivoji urged INEC to compile and publish list of uncollected PVCs and engage political parties’ leaders in each local government to meet their owners.
Also speaking, Mr Moshood Mayegun, the Deputy Chairman, APC in Lagos State said that the party leaders were putting machinery in place to mobilise applicants, advised INEC engaged community associations.
Mr Ibrahim Adeoye, the State Organising Secretary of Young Progressive Party (YPP) called on INEC to embrace technologies fully in electoral processes to curb stress in registration and electoral violence, above the use of BVAS only.
Commenting, Mr Olusegun Mobolaji, the State Chairman, Inter Party Advisory Committee (IPAC), who said INEC needed to do more in decentralisation of CVR and PVCs with a pledge that party leaders would work with INEC.
