Lagos and Kano states have maintained the lead in the number of registered voters for the forthcoming 2019 general elections.
This was contained in the voters register presented by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to political parties in Abuja on Monday, January 7, Punch reports.
We gathered that out of the 84,004,084 Nigerians will vote in the elections, Lagos state accounts for 6.6 million, while Kano accounts for 5.5 million.
Recall that in the 2015 general elections, Lagos and Kano states recorded 5.8 million and 5.0 million respectively.
According to the voter register south south has 12,841,279 voters. Southeast recorded 10,052,236, southwest has 16,292,212, northwest recorded 20,158,100, northeast has 11,289,293, and north-central recorded 13, 366,070.
The analysis of the voter register indicates that female voters constitute 47.14%, which is 39,598,645 voters; while male voters constitute 52.85%, which is 44,405,439 voters.
Youths that will be participating in the elections (18-35) constitute 51.11%, which is 42,938,458 voters; while the middle aged (36-50) constitute 29.97%, which is 25,176,144.
The analysis shows that the elderly (51-70) constitute 15.22%, which amounted to 3,100,971 voters; while the old (70+) constitute 3.69%, which is 3,100,971 voters.
We previously reported that an alarm was raised by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on the new method of vote buying, saying politicians were buying permanent voters cards ahead of the 2019 general elections.
The chairman of INEC, Professor Mahmood Yakubu, who raised the alarm on Monday, January 7, said politicians were also inducing voters financially to collect the voter identification number on their permanent voters cards.
The INEC boss raised the alarm during the commission’s quarterly consultative meeting with political parties in Abuja.
He said: “A new method of vote-buying is being devised. We have received credible information that some partisan actors are now going round buying up PVCs from voters or financially inducing them to collect the VINs on their PVCs.
“In some instances, telephone numbers and details of bank accounts of voters have been collected. By collecting the PVCs, their intention may be to deprive the voters of voting since no one can vote without the PVC. By collecting their phone numbers and bank details, the intention is to induce voters by electronic transfer of funds to their accounts since it will be difficult to buy votes at polling units.
“By collecting the VINs, they may be acting on the mistaken notion that our system can be hacked into and the card readers somehow preloaded ahead of election and compromised. We want to assure Nigerians that we are aware of the new tricks.”
