2023: Uncollected PVCs will lead to disenfranchisement, says CSO

A human rights organisation under the aegis of Youth Empowerment Solutions Project Initiatives popularly known as YES Project on Tuesday raised concern over the number of Permanent Voters Cards not yet collected saying it was a recipe for disenfranchisement in the 2023 election.

To check the trend, Yes Project said it would ensure that 60 per cent of young voters collect their PVCs for them to vote in 2023.

The organisation, therefore, called on young Nigerians to come out en masse to collect their Permanent Voters Cards during the duration stipulated by Independent National Electoral Commission to enable them vote during the 2023 general elections.

The Executive Director of Yes Project, Oche-Precious Edeh, said getting registered was the first step in electoral compliance process as stipulated by INEC and the Nigerian constitution.

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To ensure PVCs are collected, Edeh said YES Project would create more awareness on the collection of voter cards, and where to pick up the cards.

According to him, the move was imperative to galvanise the inclusion of youths in politics.

“To change this trend and ensure that 60 per cent young voters collect thier PVCs and vote, YES Project came up with various initiatives to surmount the challenge”, he stated.

He said Nigeria has around 200 million population with young person around 15 to 35 accounting for the highest demography of the population.

Edeh said that through the efforts of INEC as well as civil society organisations like YES Project, a lot of young people participated in the voter registration.

He said the register witnessed the registration of youths between ages 18 to 34 making up a total of 7,286,871 accounting for 76.56 per cent of the total newly registered voters of 9,518,188.

“It is quite shocking when in September this year, INEC confirmed that the number of uncollected PVCs is over 20 million. There is need for us to tactfully engage the youths through community to ensure they complete the the electoral process of transitioning from PVC registration to collection and voting.

“With a total of 93,522,272 the number of uncollected PVCs account from 19.2 per cent registered voters. We need to keep the pace of engaging citizens especially youths in politics”, Edeh said.

He listed social media promotion and door to door PVC mobilisation campaign as one of such interventions to create more awareness on PVC collection and where to pick up.