Youths top as over 1m voters register Online

Four weeks after the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) commenced the online pre-registration of voters, 73.5 per cent of the one million people who have registered online are youths.

The National Commissioner and Chairman, Information and Voter Education Committee (IVEC) of INEC, Festus Okoye, yesterday in Abuja, said as at 7.am the number of new registrants had risen to 1,006,661.

According to him, the detailed distribution of the registrants by age, state/FCT, gender, occupation and disability for week four of the exercise has been uploaded to the commission’s website and social media platforms.

He explained that, “However, the distribution by age still shows that 740,063 (or 73.5 per cent) are young Nigerians between the ages of 18 and 34.”

He said as earlier announced by the commission, physical or in-person registration was to begin on Monday, July 26, 2021, at INECs 811 state and local government area offices nationwide.

He further said, “The exact locations of the designated centres have already been uploaded to our website and social media platforms. For further details, citizens are encouraged to contact our state offices through the dedicated telephone numbers provided in the uploaded publication.

“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.”

Meanwhile, Labour Party (LP), African Democratic Congress (ADC) and Young Progressives Party (YPP) have alleged fraud in the number of the newly registered voters in Osun State and have demanded a forensic audit.

The Chairmen of the three parties, Prince Bello Adebayo, Dr Idowu Omidiji and Comrade Remi Ayanlad respectively, at a joint press conference in Osogbo, the Osun state capital, yesterday, described as outrageous the 259,450 number of voters in Osun as contained in the records of INEC.