2019 ELECTIONS: NPC boss says INEC can’t have all dead persons removed from voters’ register
INEC has asked the National Population Commission to provide details of dead persons so that their records can be removed from he voter register ahead of the 2019 elections.
The electoral body says it wants to ensure a clean voter register ahead of the elections.
INEC Chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, said on Tuesday that the commission would like the National Population Commission “to provide all records of deaths of citizens since 2015 so that INEC can take the necessary steps to remove them from the voter register.
“We are confident that you will oblige us so that we can further clean up our voter register ahead of the 2019 general elections.”
The NPC Chairman, Mr. Eze Duruiheoma (SAN), said his commission would gladly assist INEC in its task ahead of the 2019 elections.
“On the removal of dead persons from the register, I believe that is a wonderful vision. In the past this was overlooked and it ended up embarrassing everybody. We will attend to that request and give it the needed attention,” he said.
Duruiheoma, however, said the agency doesn’t have the statistics of births and deaths from 2015 till date.
He, however, said the 40 or 50 per cent statistics available would be made available to the electoral body.
“We don’t pretend to have registered every death. In the same way we don’t pretend to have captured every birth. But there must be a starting point. Assuming in the last one year, we have registered 20,000 deaths. The 20,000 should be expunged from the register as a starting point,” he said.
“You must count one before counting two. So, that’s the collaboration between NpopC and INEC. We don’t have 100 per cent coverage on the registration of deaths in the same way we don’t have 100 per cent coverage of births. But at least the 45 or 50 per cent coverage we have is what we can give to INEC because it is what you have that you can give.”
