Edo Resident Electoral Commissioner, Dr Johnson Alalibo has revealed that the Independent National Electoral Commission will retain the 2019 Edo voter register for the governorship election due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Alalibo made this known during a dialogue with Nigeria Civil Society Situation Room, a coalition of over 70 civil society organsiations in Abuja.
According to him, there are 2,210,534 total registered voters in Edo while the voter cards collected are 1,726,738.
“The commission suspended the collection of voter cards with continuous voter registration due to the COVID-19 pandemic. So, we are reverting to what we had in the 2019 general election, that is what we are using.
“Since the release of the Edo election time table, the commission has been occupied with various activities in relation to the election, ranging from monitoring of political parties primaries to publication of forms with names of candidates.
“We have received some non-sensitive materials and we are still receiving them and distributing them to Local Government Areas.
“We had a shortfall of smart card readers, we requested and they have brought some from sister states. We have concluded the configuration of smart card readers and printing of voter register.’’
