From many states in the South West, South East, South-South, and some North Central geopolitical zones, getting a PVC has been like trying to get a camel through the eye of a needle.

Even though the cards are now being given out in Registration Areas/Wards that are closer to the people, people are still having trouble getting their PVCs. This is so bad that Nigerians have to wait in line for long hours at different collection centres all over the country.

Promises have been made, strong campaigns have been run, jingles and several social media platforms have been used effectively to get people involved and make sure the cards are collected and distributed smoothly, but the problems haven't gone away very much.

It has been so bad that many Nigerians in different states who went to their wards and Local Government Areas (LGAs) without any hope of getting their PVCs are now worried that they might not be able to vote in the elections next month if things don't get better.

From one state to the next, there have been a lot of voters, which is great and encouraging. However, many of them have left the registration areas/ward centres disappointed because they had to wait for hours and hours without getting their cards.

Even though the commission told people who wanted to vote that they shouldn't wait until the last day to pick up their cards, many people who wanted to vote did so anyway.

Agnes Akpe, who is the head of FCT INEC's Voter Education, Publicity, Gender, and Civil Societies Liaison Department, warned applicants last month not to wait until the last minute to pick their cards.

"After going through the registration process, I won't tell anyone to wait. PVC should be bought now. Akpe asked for help as soon as possible and said, "The response is actually very impressive." I think it shows that the people now have faith in INEC. They think that INEC can be trusted. INEC has said that votes will count, and because votes will count, people will come out to get their PVCs and make sure that their votes count.

"This is why they're coming. If they had stayed in the sun, they would have been bored and no one would have cared. But imagine that they stayed in the sun and got up early. She said, "They want something, and they are determined to get it."

But the turnout has always left people sad and frustrated. People have given different reasons for the problems, such as the staff or agents of the commission trying to get money from the applicants or the staff not being available to help the growing number of people who want to vote but can't get their cards.

The voters' lack of interest in going to the distribution centres to get their cards, despite pleas from the right people, is also to blame.

In Lagos, it was a bit of everything. Reports say that the number of people who signed up to vote ranged from low to moderate to high. In some wards, where the number of applicants was low, the distribution went smoothly, but in other places, where there were a lot of applicants, it was very hard.

Overall, the ongoing distribution exercise in the state has been dominated by the fact that INEC officials aren't always there to tell people what they need to do or how to do it, allegations of racial segregation, and allegations of extortion.

In some places, people had to wait in the hot sun, but those who could pay a certain amount of money to available agents who helped with the process got theirs first. Those who couldn't pay had to grit their teeth and wait for hours in bad weather before they got theirs.

Some applicants are said to have paid as much as N3000 or even more to avoid the hostility that comes with getting a card. This is true even if they came with their spouses, because the extortion is based on individual deals.

Concerning the situation in Lagos, there have been claims of favouritism for "indigenes" and racial discrimination against "non-indigenes," who are often made to wait in the scorching sun before they can get their cards.

INEC's latest numbers show that over 1.5 million PVCs have not yet been collected, even though the national and state leaders of the commission have worked hard and tried to help.

People in other South West states, on the other hand, had a different experience. Reports say that in Ondo, the turnout in different wards across the 18 local councils has been so high that INEC workers usually have a hard time helping the people who want to vote.

Some of the people who registered had to wait for hours to get their cards because the process wasn't organised and the officials hadn't made enough plans for it to go smoothly. In other states in the same geopolitical zone, on the other hand, it was a walk in the park.

Reports say that things were the same in both Ogun and Ekiti states. Many wards have had low voter turnout. Only a small number of people who came out to get their PVCs in those states were able to do so without any trouble.

Some South-South states, like Edo, Rivers, Cross-River, and Bayelsa, had both logistical problems and smooth processes for voters who wanted to get their cards.

Reports say that the distribution of PVCs has gone smoothly in most wards of Edo, with a moderate number of people going to the centres and getting their cards without much trouble.

It might have been the other way around in Port Harcourt, the capital of Rivers State, where there have been crazy crowds. People went to their ward collection centres to get their cards in a calm environment. This meant that INEC staff had to hand out the available PVCs while Nigerian police kept an eye on things.

But things were different in Cross River, where the slow process of giving out the money kept a lot of people from applying. The crowds that rushed into the centres made it hard for INEC workers to keep order.

Bayelsa has been sad to see how tense it has become. Reports say that most registered voters who went to the collection centres at the different wards in the state's riverine areas were disappointed because the people who were supposed to help them were either not there or weren't good enough, which caused delays in many parts of the state.

In some states in the North-Central zone, the situation isn't all that different. Applicants have a hard time getting their cards because there are so many of them at the centres.

In most states in the North West and North East geopolitical zones, however, the distribution and collection of PVCs have continued to go smoothly, with few or no problems.

It was a situation that led to rumours that either there was a plan to get rid of all the cards and have a centrally organised, clinical voting process or that the commission made things easier for the geopolitical zones.

But because it was hard to get the PVCs, many of the people who wanted them told the commission they should come up with ways to let people know when their cards are ready so they don't waste time and energy going to the centres when their cards aren't ready.

"Since they have the applicants' phone numbers, the commission should send them text messages when their cards are ready, instead of making them go to the centres and wait for hours only to find out that their cards aren't ready," said a frustrated applicant.

A group of Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) complained about the problems with collecting PVCs and asked for the deadline for distributing the cards that hadn't been collected to be moved back.

Yiaga Africa, Women Advocates and Research Development Centre (WARDC), Connecthub, Enough is Enough Nigeria, Fixpolitics, Centre for Journalism Innovation and Development (CJID), Kimpact Development Initiative (KDI), and the Electoral College of Nigeria were all part of the coalition.

In a recent joint statement, they complained that Nigerians had to waste money and time going to INEC's offices around the country only to be told that their cards were not ready and they should come back.

"In some places where cards are also available, registered voters complain that the process of collecting PVCs is messy and hard to understand."

"In other places, there seems to be extortion, as @samking10011 from the INEC office in Uvwie LGA, Delta State, recorded and tweeted," the statement said.

"We urge INEC to make sure that the Citizens' Contact Centre works well, to set up a dedicated desk for CSOs, the media, and citizens to report problems and get them fixed quickly, and to set up a way for people to report INEC officials who try to extort money from people or share false information on purpose to keep them from voting. We also want the deadline for collecting PVCs to be moved back," they said.

But in separate responses to questions from the Daily Sun, Festus Okoye, the National Commissioner and Chairman of the Information and Voter Education Committee, and Rotimi Oyekanmi, the Chief Press Secretary to the INEC Chairman, dismissed some of the claims that were made.

"From what we hear, Nigerians are getting their PVCs with little or no delay in many parts of the country," said the CPS. But we are also aware that there are problems in some places, and the commission is working to fix these problems to cut down on delays and speed up the process of collecting PVC.

He also said that the claims of extortion at some centres were not true. He asked anyone with proof or relevant information to tell the commission so that any staff member found to be guilty could be punished.

"PVCs are picked up for free, and our staff won't ask for anything in return for doing their jobs. Our staff has been working nonstop, even on Saturdays and Sundays, to get the cards to the people who should have them. They should be praised for what they did.

"However, if a citizen meets an INEC worker who asks for money, they should report the name of the worker and the place where they met them. We'll look into it right away," he promised.

Oyekanmi got angry when he heard that the commission was accused of favouring one ethnic group over another. He said, "Anyone who says or claims that the commission is making it easier to collect PVCs in most parts of a section of the country is a bad person who just wants to put the lives of our staff in danger."

(Source: www.sunnewsonline.com)