INEC Holds Mock Accreditation of Voters September 10 Ahead of Edo Guber Election

•Says 125,928 PVCs out of 184,438 collected

Adedayo Akinwale in Abuja

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has announced that it would hold mock accreditation of voters ahead of the Edo State governorship election scheduled to hold on September 21.

INEC National Commissioner and Chairman, Information and Voter Education Committee, Sam Olumekun, in a statement issued yesterday, revealed that the mock accreditation would hold on September 10.

Olumekun said, “In continuation of preparations for the Edo State governorship election holding on Saturday 21st September 2024, the commission is test running the deployment of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) and result upload to the INEC Result Viewing (IReV) portal for the election using live voters in select locations in the state.

“For this purpose, the commission has designated 12 polling units across six Local Government Areas (LGAs) covering the three Senatorial Districts of the state as centres for the mock accreditation.”

Olumekun added that in Edo Central, the exercise would take place at Eguare Primary School, Eguare 1, and Uwenujie Primary School, Uwenujie, in Esan Central Local Government Area, as well as Eguare Primary School 1, Ewohimi, and Eguare Okhuesan (Former L. A. School 1), Emu, in Esan South East Local Government Area.

He stressed that in Edo North, Usokwi Iyogbe Azama Primary School, Yeluwa, and the polling unit at Institute of Continuing Education Road, Auchi, in Etsako West Local Government Area, were the designated centres, while Uhonmwora Owere Primary School, Uhonmwora-Ora, and Holy Trinity Grammar School, Sabongidda-Ora, will serve as centres in Owan West Local Government Area.

The national commissioner stated that in Edo South, Western Boys’ High School 1 and Ologbosere Primary School 1 were the designated centres in Ikpoba Okha Local Government Area, while Idia College I and Payne Primary School 1 would serve as centres for Oredo Local Government Area.

Olumekun stated, “The mock exercise will be held on Tuesday 10th September 2024 at the designated polling units from 8.30am to 2.30pm.

“A graphic image containing the names and locations of the centres has been uploaded to our website and social media platforms for public information.”

Meanwhile, INEC announced that a total of 125,928 Permanent Voter’s Cards (PVCs) were collected, out of 184,438 voters’ cards ahead of the September governorship election.

The commission had announced that the recent Continuous Voter Registration (CVR) in Edo State would be available for collection at two levels, first, across all the 192 wards from August 22 to August 26, and, secondly, in all the 18 local government offices.

Olumekun, in another statement, said the commission had concluded collection at the ward level.

He stated, “The commission is pleased to announce the conclusion of the collection at Ward level. Learning from the lessons of previous collection of PVCs, the commission has carefully packaged all the PVCs by Poling Units, Wards and LGAs.

“We also produced the collection register, providing details of the voters whose cards were ready for collection and uploaded same to our website.

“In addition, we contacted them using the addresses provided at the time of registration. “As a result, out of the 184,438 new PVCs available, 125,928 cards were collected by voters, representing 68.3 per cent of the total.

“This is the highest percentage of PVCs collected in five days since the commission introduced the CVR ahead of off-cycle governorship elections in 2015.”