• Says era of manipulating the process over for good

Ahead of the 2023 general election in Oyo State, the Resident Electoral Commissioner, Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, in the State, Dr Mutiu Agboke has revealed that over 754, 000 Permanent Voter Cards, PVCs remained uncollected by prospective voters who have registered in the State.

The REC revealed this during a radio programme which featured him in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital. The programme was monitored by the HorizonTimes.

Agboke, while appealing to the owners of the PVCs to come out and collect their cards reiterated that the unclaimed PVCs are enough to make someone a governor of Oyo State, explaining that not even the present Governor, Engr Seyi Makinde emerged with such number of votes in the 2019 election.

He further explained that the online continuous voters’ registration will be suspended by the 30th of May, adding that this will allow the Commission the process to print cards for those who have registered.

Agboke said, “As it is now, we have, those who have completed their registrations, 188, 789 and people should know, INEC is combining both online and physical registrations and by 30th of this month, we are going to suspend the online registration so that we can engage in other housekeeping works that will result into final printing of the cards.

“But my major advocacy now is that people of Oyo State are still refusing to collect their PVCs. As I speak with you now, we have over 745, 000 uncollected PVCs.

“If you look at the result of the last election in Oyo State, the winner of that election did not score up to the number of the cards that are unclaimed. Even if you put together the number of votes scored by the winner of the election and the first runner up, they are just a little bit higher than the numbers of these cards.

“The implication is that these cards alone can make somebody a governor in Oyo State, and people are sited at home.”

He further called on those who registered between June and December last year to go out for the cards explaining that they are ready at their various local government offices.

He called on all politicians vying for one office or the other to join in the advocacy to appeal to registered voters to claim their cards.

“People should also know, those who register in between June and December last year, their cards are already printed at the local governments, they should go there and collect their PVCs.

“And I am using this medium again, to tell those politicians that are interested in vying for any political office, to go to stations and do advocacy for voters to collect their PVCs.”

Agboke however reiterated that with the introduction of Bimodal Voters Accreditation System introduced by INEC, nobody can manipulate the system or rely on anyone rigging the election on their behalf.

Agboke said, “The era of rigging elections, fabricating figures, is over. No REC can do anything for you. What determines the election now is the transparency, you can sit anywhere, view the portal on election day and see the run of results, no REC can do any manipulation for anybody.

“Expecting any election to be rigged now is living in the past; expecting ‘injuries’ to happen to counted elections is in the past; the game changer not even the card reader, it is the Bimodal Voters Accreditation System and this is the system you can't beat.

“The era of using hooliganism to win election is over and that's why we are addressing issues of voter apathy, people should come out and vote, your vote ‘ll count. We told them in 2019 that nobody will win in any level of election in Oyo State except those who were voted for, and that was exactly what happened.

“We stood by the process and ask them to watch us, I am not a REC that sits inside AC and that is how to be transparent and that is what we did and that is what INEC is doing. I call on the people of Oyo State to watch me and they can be rest assured that I have my name and integrity to protect and that is the mandate of INEC in Nigeria.”

When asked about the allegation of bribery by the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Agboke said he remained unshaken by those false allegations adding that he tried to institute a legal process against the peddlers of the news, but that the publisher remained faceless till date.

 Describing the allegation as dead story, Agboke said, “That's a dead story, I was looking for the publisher, my writ of summon was ready, I wanted to teach him a lesson, unfortunately, there was no name to put there. I would have thought him a lesson.

“On the last election day, they alleged that I collected $2.2b, my uncle had to call me from abroad on the issue. But I am not bothered about that nonsense. I have been in Oyo State since after the election and I have been taking, I have no secret with anybody, but they always want you to do their things in their own way, but we are going to do the right thing.

“I was tried, I was harassed, I was intimidated but I insist, nothing will happen to me, I am a Muslim and I stand by my God. It is like fighting the rock by hitting the head on the rock, a head will explode and not the rock.”