Prayer points won’t count, but your vote will - INEC tells Nigerians

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) says it is set to conduct Saturday’s election in the Federal Capital Territory, urging Nigerians to come out en masse to vote.

“Your prayer points will not count. It is your vote that will count,” said Agnes Akpe, head of INEC’s voter education and publicity department in the FCT, as she advised FCT residents to come out and vote to elect new leaders.

Akpe debunked the notion that people without their vote cards could vote with just the last six digits of their cards, stressing that the Electoral Act stipulated that people must be present with their PVCs before voting.

“Without your PVC, there is no voting,” added the INEC official.

She called on residents to come out with their PVCs, locate their polling units ahead of time and vote, stating that non-sensitive materials had been distributed weeks ago.

Akpe said the distribution of sensitive materials began on Thursday, and the last batch was distributed to the Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMAC) on Friday.

She revealed that the sensitive materials were collected from the Central Bank of Nigeria on Thursday.

Akpe mentioned that the materials were brought to the six area councils so stakeholders such as the media, political parties, IPAC and other agents could witness the distribution.

“So, we brought the materials for the six area councils here. The reason for bringing them here was that the media could be a witness and the political parties, IPAC was also present and other agents,” explained the INEC official. “Aside from that, we also needed to add the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) that was with us because we had to configure them for each of the polling units.”

Akpe added, “So when they brought the ballot papers, we added the BVAS for each area council and sent them under heavy security. So far, we have concluded that by this morning, so we are pretty much ready.”




FI