The Bayelsa Government has pledged to mobilise its citizenry to collect their Permanent Voters Cards to enable them to fully participate in the 2019 general elections.
The Independent National Electoral Commission said that no fewer than 28, 590 PVCs were yet to be collected by their owners while more than 65,000 new voters had been captured in the state during the recent registration exercise.
Daniel Iworiso-Markson, Commissioner for Information in the state made the pledge on Sunday while in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria at Opume in Ogbia Local Government Area.
He said that the state government would mobilise the citizenry in realisation that the people were at the centre of political activities and should be encouraged to participate in the electoral process.
Iworiso-Markson said: “The government of Governor Seriake Dickson realises that politics is about numbers and given the renewed confidence that we have in INEC that our votes do count, we are relying on the people and hence mobilising them to participate in elections.
“Since we abhor politics of violence in elections, our strategy is to increase the participation of the people.
“In Ogbia, we used to record the second largest votes but we have dropped to the fifth, due to apathy.
“So we are looking forward to closing that gap in future elections.”
Iworiso-Markson who monitored the just concluded Continuous Voters Registration in the area expressed satisfaction at the turn out and further appealed to INEC to extend the exercise to capture all eligible voters.
He said that after the three weeks period of the CVR, prospective voters were still turning up for the exercise which ended on Friday.
He said: “The people of Opume kingdom have shown so much enthusiasm in responding to the call to participate in their civic responsibility to participate in the electoral process.
“They keep coming out and even on the final day of the exercise some people are yet to be captured and we are hoping that INEC officers will report to the leadership for possible extension.”