Temidayo Akinsuyi, Lagos

Afenifere, pan- Yoruba socio-political organisation on Tuesday said the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and its immediate past chairman, Prof. Attahiru Jega should be held responsible over the rampant cases of underage voters which is prevalent in the Northern part of the country.
In a chat with DAILY INDEPENDENT, Yinka Odumakin, the organisation’s National Publicity Secretary said it is surprising that children can be seen voting in some sections of the country when the law of the country stipulates that anyone below the age of 18 is not eligible to vote.
While also holding Jega responsible for the anomaly, Afenifere said in the build up to the 2015 general election, while INEC under Jega’s leadership distributed the PVCs to individuals in the Southern part of the country, they allegedly handed them over to Emirs in the North, who in turn distributed them to everyone in their locality, including children.

While calling for an investigation into the issue, Afenifere said urgent action must be taken to correct the anomaly before the 2019 election saying failure to do so may hamper the conduct of free, fair and credible polls next year.

“It is a shame on INEC that we agreed as a nation that the voting age is 18 yet we saw all those babies holding PVCs in the North. They did it during the 2015 election and I am putting the blame on INEC because no state registers voters in Nigeria, it is the responsibility of INEC. How did those voters cards get into the hands of those children?”

“We learnt that in 2015 what INEC did under Jega after the voters registration was to give voters cards to individuals in the South but handed them over to Emirs in the North, who are just giving it to anybody that is available. So, one is not surprised that some babies who were just born were allocated PVCs”.
“We cannot have different nations in a country. If we agreed that the required age for voting under the law is 18, then that law should apply to every parts of the country and those violating it should be sanctioned. We must put a stop to this before the next election” he said.
The electoral body has come under fire recently after videos went viral showing young children brandishing Permanent Voters Cards (PVCs) and thumb printing, an incident stakeholders claimed took place during the last local government election in Kano state.


Read more https://independent.ng/afenifere-blames-inec-jega-age-voting/

Yep