Days To Osun Election, APC Claims 500,000 Permanent Voter Cards Have Been Cloned

According to Sahara Reporters, the All Progressives Congress (APC) has aired major concern on the Aug. 9 gubernatorial election in Osun State, claiming around half a million unclaimed and misplaced Permanent Voters Cards (PVCs), have been duplicated by by fraudsters with intent to rig the process. ”These cloned cards, mostly in the hands of persons from states other than Osun, are to be used along with the authentic PVCs issued to the electorate in Osun state during the Aug. 9 Osun governorship election,” the party said in a statement issued Monday by Alhaji Lai Mohammed, its National Publicity Secretary. “Already, we can confirm that the hundreds of thousands of people in possession of these cloned cards all over Nigeria, especially in the states neighboring Osun, are being induced monetarily and instructed to super impose their photographs on the cloned PVCs. The party also suggests that security agents in on the scheme will be present at polling centers in order to harrass and arrest those protesting these illegalities. ”Conniving electoral officials will turn a blind eye to this fraud by not checking whether or not the names of these impersonators with cloned cards are on the voters register before going ahead to accredit them, to pave the way for them to use the cloned cards to vote at the expense of the genuine holders of the cards,” it said. Calling on INEC to assure and ensure maximum fairness in the election, the party stated: ”We also demand that copies of these registers, which are already in possession of the local government electoral officers, be made available to all political parties at least 72 hours before the election. Anything short of using the registers that contained the names of the authentic voters will not be acceptable,” it cautioned. APC encourages vigilance on the part of voters and security agents in order to maintain credibilty in the August 9 election. ”No power is bigger than people’s power, and no inducement is worth anyone’s conscience. The votes of the people of the state of Osun must not only be counted, but must count on Saturday,” it concluded.