Nigeria: INEC Investigates Viral Video of Extortion During PVCs Collection

30 January 2023

"We are looking at getting the Electoral Officer in charge of the area to liaise with his staff to know who actually gave the woman the cards."

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) said it is investigating a viral video of extortion in Enugu East Local Government Area of Enugu State during the collection of Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs).

Head of the Department of Voter Education and Publicity in the Enugu State branch of INEC, Rex Achumie, made this known when he spoke with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Monday in Enugu.

The video showed a woman extorting N1,000 each from registrants who wanted to collect their PVCs.

She said in the video that the N1,000 was to cover her transport fare and other stress she went through to get the cards to a primary school in a neighbourhood in the local government area.

Mr Achumie said the woman in question is not a staffer or ad-hoc member of staff of INEC.

According to him, none of the people in the video is an INEC employee.

"INEC wants to unravel how the cards got into the hands of the unscrupulous woman in the first place.

"We are looking at getting the Electoral Officer in charge of the area to liaise with his staff to know who actually gave the woman the cards," he said.

Mr Achumie assured that INEC would get a clearer picture of the whole episode by Tuesday as well as "where and whom the woman in question is working for".

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