My Experience at theVoter's card Registration Centre

Some few weeks back I could recall going to register my voter's card with my brother at the Independent national electoral commission(INEC). I went early as I can in the morning. The place was very far compared to where I was living. I thought that going there early might give me an edge over others who won't come early. The deadline for the voter's card registration was fast approaching and I needed to register fast so that I can have access to vote in the forthcoming elections. Unfortunately on getting to the venue, I was surprised to see many people there already who came for the same thing for the same purpose. Indeed, I was flabbergasted and disappointed knowing quite well that I will have to stay for a while before getting the registration done.

To my greatest surprise, I learned that some people have come early since 4 am so that they won't miss out when the registration starts, and the overall shocker was that those who came early have gotten their names written down on a list and that's only the number the officials in charge of the registration are going to deal with first before others. The list contained more than 30 people. It dawned on me that I and my brother don't stand a chance of getting registered early.

Many others left their work to come early in the morning and hope they get done with the registration as soon as possible. But things have gone another way. As a citizen of this country, I always heard about corruption in the high places but what most people failed to realize is that corruption doesn't start from the apex but at the grassroots; among individuals and persons. The list that was created to include people in the order of their arrival was instructed to start from number 11 instead of number one. That means 10 people are already removed privately from the list. So the first person that came early as 4 am that day had to start with being the eleventh person instead of the number one.

I just hope this country only gets better. I was hoping for a more advanced state where we can register ourselves online and get all that we need to vote online too instead of doing it physically. I spend a lot of money on transport fares in trying to register for my voter's card which was futile as a result of too many people who are also in my shoes and the inability of the officials to register all of us on the same day.

The registration process was even slow for those on the list. So the ten people from the list are privately removed from the list, where did they come from? because the list started counting from number eleven. That means the first 10 people were sourced using another means. I learned that those people include those who pay to get preferential treatment so that they can get registered quickly ahead of others. Truth or lie, I don't know. I just heard that from others saying. It's sad how bad the country has gone. So if I was with money then that day I could have bought my way in among the first ten people and got registered. Voting is our right as citizens but some people want to monetize it because of personal gain.

I waited for up to like two hours. When I saw that the registration isn't speeding up as it should due to many reasons such as server problems among others. I left there disappointed. Only God knows if I will be able to register before the deadline.My Experience at the Voter's card Registration Centre