The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) will today display the preliminary register of voters, even as it has issued guidelines on how one can inspect the register.
The register shall be on display from 9am to 5pm every day until February 19.The commission has disclosed that multiple registration had been uncovered and that the names of the culprits were being compiled for prosecution.
The chief press secretary to the INEC chairman, Kayode Idowu, confirmed to LEADERSHIP yesterday that the register would be displayed in all the registration units and advised those that registered to go and verify their entries.
According to Idowu, the display of the voter register, which will be done simultaneously in all registration units, would accord everybody easy access to the register for inspection.
When asked about the total number of registered voters collated by INEC, Idowu said he was not in a position to disclose that, but assured that the figures would be made public today. INEC chairman Professor Attahiru Jega had last week announced that 63, 981, 460 voters' names had so far been collated by the commission, although it was expected that at least 65 million voters might be recorded.
INEC at the weekend released guidelines for the display of the preliminary voter register in all the 120,000 registration units across the country. The guidelines, which were contained in a statement issued by the secretary to the commission, Abdullahi A. Kaugama, said that "the display period shall afford any person qualified for registration as a voter, to, if his/her name is omitted, or is incorrectly stated in the register, claim in writing in Form EC2, to have his/her name inserted or to have such entry corrected or any other omission inserted".
The statement further explains: "Any person may, by notice in writing in Form EC2, object to the inclusion of any name appearing in the preliminary register on the grounds that the person: (a) is not a citizen of Nigeria; (b) has not attained the age of 18 years; or (c) is not ordinarily resident or works in or originates from or an indigene of the area; or (d) is dead; or (c) is legally incapacitated to vote."
The statement lists the procedure of the display as follows: "A registrant checks the display board at the Registration Unit where he registered; If the Registrant is dissatisfied, he will approach the Revision Officer to make a claim or an objection; The Revision Officer issues the appropriate Form (either EC2 in case of claims or EC3 in case of objections)
"The Registrant completes the form and submits to the Revision Officer; The Revision Officer issues notice of (EO 20F) for hearing of the claims or objections within the period allowed for display; The revision officer hears and determines the claims and objections at the appointed time and venue.
"The revision officer forwards all decisions taken and all completed and other unused materials to the Resident Electoral Commissioner through the Electoral Officer for further necessary action'.
According to the guidelines, "Within the period allowed by the Commission for display of the Register, any person qualified for registration as voter, may, if his/her name is omitted, or is incorrectly stated in the Register, claim in writing in Form EC2 (attached) to have his name inserted or to have such entry, correction or any other omission inserted.
"Any person may, by notice in writing in Form EC3 (attached), object to the inclusion of any name appearing in the preliminary register on the grounds that the person:(a) is not a citizen of Nigeria; or(b) has not attained the age of 18 years; or(c) is not ordinarily resident or works in, or originates from or an indigene of that area; or(d) is dead; or(e) is legally incapacitated to vote.
It further explains that 'If the Registrant is dissatisfied, he will approach the revision officer to make a claim or an objection; The revision officer issues the appropriate Form (either EC 2 in case of claims or EC 3 in case of objection); The registrant completes the form and submits to the revision officer."
The guidelines also stipulated that "the revision officer issues notice (EC 20F) for hearing of the claims or objections within the period allowed for display; The revision officer hears and determines the claims and objections at the appointed time and venue; The revision officer forwards all decisions taken and all completed and other unused materials to resident electoral commissioner through the electoral officer for further necessary action.
On the issuance of duplicate voter's card or slip, the commission said 'A person whose voters' slip or card is lost, or torn or defaced shall at 30 days to the polls apply to the Commission for issuance of a Duplicate Voters' slip or card - and that shall be before March 2."
The guidelines however stated that "an application for issuance shall be accompanied by:(a) proof of identity; and (b) a processing fee of N50.00 as may be determined from time to time by the Commission.
"An applicant who satisfies the conditions 3.2 and whose name appears on the register of Voters shall be issued with a duplicate copy of voters slip or card marked "Duplicate".
The guidelines also indicate that (a) "Changes in the Register are only to be made on the authority of the Resident electoral commissioner, including such access to the databases.
(b) "Any voter that needs recapturing of his/her biometrics shall present themselves to the Resident electoral commissioner who will authorise use of the DDC machine to do same, and issue fresh TV. Such captured data should be aggregated and consolidated with that of the existing preliminary register of voters.
(c) "The revision officer shall have a second copy of the preliminary register and shall clearly mark and indicate cases that require the attention of the Electoral Officer.
(d) "All agreed corrections or modifications that require eventual changes in the aggregated or consolidated register shall be documented for the Resident Electoral Commissioner by the Electoral Officer for further action'.
The initial registration of voters began on January 15 and ended on January 29 before it was extended for another one week till February 5, 2011.
It will be recalled that at the close of the registration exercise on Saturday, February 5, the commission opted for selective extension of the Voter Registration exercise to mop-up registrants in heavily populated centres/polling units across the country where it verified that there were still long queues.
Meanwhile, the INEC spokesman in Kwara state, Barrister Jacob Ayanda has said the names of those who registered more than once were uncovered with the help of the automated finger identification system (AFIS), a special server device for detection of multiple registration.
He said that the people involved in the illegal act put on caps during their first registration but removed the caps during the second registration at different centres, using different names and addresses. Ayanda also said that the women amongst them put on head gears in the first instance and removed same in the subsequent registration.
"But with the aid of the Automated Finger Identification System, we were able to detect and identify the multiple registrants and we are compiling their names for necessary legal actions' he assured
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