People Democratic Party, PDP, stalwart in Lagos State, Dr. Adetokunbo Pearse, has charged INEC to decentralise the production of Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) to accelerate issuance.
Pearse, the Convener, Reset Lagos and chairmanship contender in the aborted Oct. 16 PDP State Congress, gave the charge when he spoke with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Sunday.
According to the PDP chieftain, it was disheartening that five months after the commencement of the on-going nationwide Continuous Voter Registration (CVR) INEC had not issued a single PVC to registrants.
“INEC is yet to issue me the PVC I registered for since 2012 registration exercise.
“It has not produced my PVC and I did everything you can imagine as a governorship candidate in 2019. I could not get my PVC till today.
“I even called INEC few days ago, and I was told it was not ready. Meanwhile, it will not allow me to do a new registration. We must begin to shout now. I plan to do a real protest on this soon,’’ the PDP stalwart said.
Pearse said that he would take INEC to court if the commission failed to issue his PVC soonest and those of others with unresolved PVC issues.
“If INEC does not give out PVCs to people that applied for it in the next three months, it should be held responsible for suppressing the votes.
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“We will not go into election under such circumstances. We are shouting now so that before we get to the middle of 2022, every eligible applicant for PVC must have their PVCs.
“The cards should be produced right away; otherwise we will take INEC to court.
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“It is almost a little too late for INEC to start production and distribution of PVCs in preparation for the 2023 general elections,’’ Pearse stressed.
The PDP chieftain suggested that INEC should allow people with Temporary Voter Cards (TVC) to vote in 2023 if it failed to produce PVCs since there was no difference between information on the TVCs and those on the PVCs.
