Four weeks after the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) commenced the online pre-registration of voters on 28th June 2021, the commission says over one million Nigerians have registered.
Festus Okoye, the National Commissioner & Chairman, Information and Voter Education Committee, said in a statement that as of 7am on Monday 26th July 2021, the number of new registrants had risen to 1,006,661.
He said the detailed distribution of the registrants by age, State/FCT, gender, occupation and disability for Week Four of the exercise had been uploaded to the commission’s website and social media platforms.
“However, the distribution by age still shows that 740,063 (or 73.5%) are young Nigerians between the ages of 18 and 34” he said.
Okoye added that physical or in-person registration begins Monday 26th July 2021 at the commission’s 811 state and local government area offices nationwide.
He said the exact locations of the designated centres have already been uploaded to INEC website and social media platforms.
He further enjoined citizens to contact the state offices of the commission through the dedicated telephone numbers provided in the uploaded publication.
The statement added: “Nigerians who pre-registered online can now complete their registration at those centres based on scheduled appointments.
“In addition, other Nigerians who prefer to register physically/in-person can now do so at those centres.
“Both online pre-registration and physical/in-person registration will continue simultaneously until the suspension of the Continuous Voter Registration (CVR) exercise on 30th June 2022 to enable the commission to clean up the data and compile the voters’ register for the 2023 General Election.
The right to vote begins with the registration of voters. Thus, as we enter the next phase of the CVR exercise, we once again appeal to all citizens who wish to register to approach any of the commission’s state or local government area offices nationwide to do so.”
Okoye, however, stressed that the ongoing registration does not include those already registered as voters.
“The current exercise is only open to Nigerians who are 18 years and above who have not registered before. It is an offence under the Electoral Act for any citizen to register more than once,” he warned.