By Paul Osuyi, Asaba
It was a carnival of sorts on Sunday at the Delta State headquarters of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in Asaba as the commission closed Continuous Voter Registration (CVR) across the country.
With music playing from a DJ booth, potential registrants waited patiently to be registered by officials.
Senior Special Assistant to Governor Ifeanyi Okowa on Talent Development, Ogusbaba Akpobome Ogude, who was one of the Masters of Ceremony, said his office partnered with INEC to keep prospective registrants entertained.
Ogude said the idea was to make the exercise more interesting so that those who came would not be disappointed and abandon the registration midway.
Also, INEC’s Head of Voter Education and Publicity in Delta State, Bukola Ojeme said the idea behind the entertainment was to eliminate areas of friction between registration officers and potential registrants.
Ojeme said the carnival started on Saturday, adding that since the beginning, the commission had experienced a peaceful exercise unlike the previous days when there used to be fights.
“Most of the time, you have tempers flared every now and then, even among the enlisted themselves.
So we thought in these last few days, let’s make fun of them somehow. Let’s try to bring entertainment and what it has done for us since yesterday (Saturday) is that we have less tension, people are relaxed, listening to music, some have participated in dance and comedy competitions and all that. It’s really fun
“And that helped us organize them better, because the tension was really so high that you say to someone stay here and they will go and stay on the other side.
“But now we have something that would make them relax and be patient with us,” he said.
Meanwhile, a group of residents have again appealed to INEC to further postpone the registration deadline
Some of the respondents complained about the slow pace of registration, saying that there were not enough machines to capture the overwhelming number of potential registrants within the period.
But Ojeme ruled out any further extension, saying INEC needed time to engage in questioning and screening of those already registered in order to achieve valid and invalid registration as well as printing of Permanent Voter Cards (PVC).
