RESIDENT Electoral Commissioner in Lagos State, Dr. Adekunle Ogunmola, said on Tuesday that the commission was set to embark on voter registration.
According to Mr. Ogunmola, everything had been put in place for the commencement of the exercise, adding that it had commenced sensitisation of the people of the state on the exercise.
“We told them that as soon as we are about starting, we will make it public.
”We have put everything in place to ensure that we commence as soon as possible.
“The machines that we will use are being cleaned up; the materials like the ink for the printers, are already with us and we have just recruited Registration Area Officers (RAO’s)”, he said.
He said that RAO’s would man clusters of wards in local governments with schedules of duty that would cover a wide range of exercises, include taking note of voters who died, with a view to de-listing their names.
He added that the others were manual registration of persons of 18 years and above, pointing out that the programme would continue till six months before the next general elections.
He said the RAO’s would also process the transfer of voters from one state to another and identify voters who lost their cards with a view to replacing them and compile comprehensive voters list.
Ogunmola said that beyond their functions, the RAOs would educate voters about the election process and democracy for people to take informed decisions on voting, among others.
He noted that de-listing names of death persons from the voter register would commence as soon as the RAO’s were deployed to their places of assignment.
Ogunmola expressed optimism that Nigeria politics would overcome money politics noting that many people were conscious of the fact that politicians who used money to entice voters, made their money through corrupt means (NAN).