Some Senior Advocates of Nigeria (SAN) have backed the intended withdrawal and destruction of uncollected Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
Chronicle NG reports that INEC is contemplating a policy to withdraw and destroy Permanent Voter Cards that remain uncollected for a decade.
This recommendation was among 208 proposals arising from the commission’s review of the 2023 general elections.
The decision resulted from the recurrent issue of unclaimed PVCs, with over six million cards still uncollected as of the 2023 elections, including many issued as long back as 2015.
Prof. Itse Sagay (SAN), the former chairman of the Presidential Advisory Committee Against Corruption, stated that some of the uncollected PVCs were most likely the result of double registration.
“They (uncollected PVCs) are taking space. My suspicion is that the owners don’t exist. It is double fraudulent registration by a lot of people.
“Just as I am sure that we are not up to 200 million, neither do I believe that we are up to 90 million registered voters when only 20 percent of that is always voting.
“There is a lot of fake information and fake facts in this country, and I’m sure this is part of it. So, let them destroy the uncollected PVCs,” he said.
Sharing the same sentiment, another SAN, Sam Erugo, said, “The PVCs have been uncollected over time, so I don’t see anything wrong in them destroying them because not collecting them means something is definitely wrong with the owners.
“Either they are dead or they are duplicates. Now, that brings the question of whether eligible voters have voter cards or whether that will impede their right to vote or not.
“That is a different question altogether, but if they have uncollected voter cards, of course, they have a right to destroy them because that will help stop people from using them to rig elections.
“Given that they are uncollected, they are useless already, and money has been wasted already.”
