VOTERS REGISTRATION: Reps okay 4 weeks extension
Headlines Jan 26, 2011

By CLIFFORD NDUJIHE, BEN AGANDE, PRINCE OSUAGWU, TORDUE SALEM & INALEGWU SHAIBU
LAGOS—WITH the concurrence of the Senate, the ongoing voters’ compilation exercise, which began on January 15 and initially scheduled to terminate on January 29 would be extended for four weeks.

In essence, Nigerians who are yet to be listed as voters would have the whole of February to do so.

The House of Representatives, which resumed from its five-week recess, yesterday, in its first sitting of 2011, amended Section 9(5) of the Electoral Act, 2010 in a record 25 minutes to grant the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, a window to drag on with the exercise to the end of February.

This came as senators reacted angrily to difficulties being experienced by Nigerians in the on going registration of voters and ordered the INEC Chairman, Prof. Attahiru Jega, to appear before it today to explain the reasons behind the recurring hitches ranging from slow to rejection of finger prints by the Direct Data Capture, DDC, machines; inadequate machines and cases of theft of the machines by goons believed to be working for politicians.

The Senate also ordered the Minister of Education to order the reopening of schools that were closed down nationwide as a result of the registration exercise “as soon as possible.”

http://www.vanguardngr.com/2011/01/voters-registration-reps-okay-4-weeks-extension/