Why extension of ongoing voters’ registration exercise is necessary-HoR

By Ihesiulo Grace

23 June 2022

Top Stories

By Tom Okpe

The House of Representatives has explained why extension of the ongoing voters’ registration in the country is necessary.

The House had requested for extensions from the Independent National Commission, (INEC) in a motion moved by Benjamin Kalu, (APC, Abia) spokesperson of the House at plenary on Tuesday for 60 days, DailyTimes gathered.

But briefing journalists after plenary on Wednesday, Chairman, House Committee on Electoral Matters, Rep Aisha Dukku gave the update in response to the point of order raised by the Minority Leader, Ndudi Elumelu.

In her presentation, Dukku affirmed that the Committee had a meeting with the INEC Chairman, who has agreed to comply with the House resolution.

She said: “As I earlier said, we met with INEC Chairman yesterday, Tuesday based on the referral to our committee. We thought it was urgent so, we invited the Chairman, Prof Yakub Mahmood and he was with us, all through yesterday.

“Part of what we agreed was, his agreement to the requested extension of the ongoing exercise but for the court injection for him to appear on the 29, June. That withstanding, he said it had been guaranteed that it had to be extended and not just extending but, additionally done through weekends. He agreed to that and will make a statement soon to that effect.

“That extension also, involves additional machines, ad-hoc staff and of course, collaborate with security agencies to make sure, every thing is well done.”

While briefing the press along with Rep Kalu, Rep Dukku indicated that the Electoral umpire was positive about the House resolutions but said it will need to go back and look at their timeline on whether the extension is feasible or not.

She said: “We saw the challenges of people queuing up to collect their PVC however, in response to the House resolution, INEC was positive about it.

“INEC will inform Nigerians in view of how many days they will agree to extend it.They said they’ll need time to clean up the register and display voters register.

“INEC, while at a meeting with the committee yesterday informed the House that the time for the registration will be increased and there will be need to provide more machines to enable easy registration of voters”.