Barely thirty days to the 2019 general election, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Kogi state has expressed worries over the 261,917 Permanent Voters Cards (PVCs) that yet to be collected by the owners.
The Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC), Professor James Apam, disclosed this in Lokoja, the state capital during an interactive session between the commission and the traditional rulers in the state.
The REC, however, appealed to the royal fathers to sensitise the electorate on the need for them to come out and claim the PVC.
According to him: “The figure is outrageous considering the importance of elections. This is worrisome and the commission is urging the traditional rulers in the state to assist us to talk to the people because their power to elect the candidates of their choice lay on the PVC.”
Apart from this, Apam also tasked the monarchs to sensitize their subjects against vote buying during elections, saying the commission had set modality in motion to tackle the scourge.
Speaking on the high spate of political violence in the state, the REC warned those destroying posters and billboards of candidates for the elections to desist, saying the development would not help to achieve violence-free elections.
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The Chairman, Kogi State Traditional Council, Michael 0Idakwo Michael Amaboni, charged INEC the to do the needful in ensuring that the 2019 elections is better than that of 2015.
He, however, lamented that the issue of vote buying should be the concern of every Nigerians, saying the action is already an indictment on the side of government that poverty is endemic in the country.
“Vote buying is as a result of poverty in the country. We are also appealing to the government at all levels to address the factors that gave rise to the recent issue of vote buying as it is not healthy for the nation democracy,” the royal father advised.
The State Director of National Orientation Agency (NOA), Mallam Mohammed Othman, attributed the current problems bedevilling the nation to the breakdown of our core values which has been jettison by the people for many years.
According to him “the long cherished and time honoured virtues of honesty, integrity, hard work, punctuality, good behaviour and patriotism are gradually giving way to dishonesty, indolence and widespread impunity and all kinds of lawlessness.
“The resultant effect of this derailment in our value system is being felt in the social, political and economic sphere”.
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