The Independent National Electoral Commission , INEC, has identified the inclusion of deceased individuals on the current voters’ register, prompting plans for a nationwide verification exercise.
INEC Chairman, Prof. Joash Amupitan, made this known on Wednesday during the Commission’s first quarterly consultative meeting with Civil Society Organisations, CSOs.
According to Amupitan, the review became necessary after analysing figures from the Anambra State off-cycle governorship election held in November, which revealed a sharp contrast between the number of registered voters and those who actually cast ballots.
“When we look at the voters register for Anambra State during the off cycle elections in November, we discovered that the number of registered voters stood at over 2.9 million, but only about 600 came out to vote.
“This is just about 20 percent of the registered voters. So, we decided to take another look at the register and we discovered names of prominent Nigerian politicians who have died still on the register.”
“That impacts on the integrity of the register and we have to do a clean up because we don’t expect the dead to come from the grave to vote”.
According to the commission, the verification process is required for sanitising the database and rebuilding public confidence in the electoral process.
The INEC chairman said the findings have raised serious questions about the reliability of the register currently being deployed for elections across the country.
He stressed that credible elections cannot be achieved without an accurate and up-to-date voters’ register, noting that the presence of ineligible names undermines confidence in the democratic process.
Amupitan disclosed that the planned verification exercise would focus on removing the names of deceased persons, correcting data errors, and working with relevant government agencies to authenticate records.
He added that the clean-up exercise is part of broader efforts by the Commission to improve electoral credibility and ensure that only eligible Nigerians are captured on the voters’ register.
Eze Chidiebere Paul
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