By Milcah Tanimu

In a surprising turn of events, an investigation by Sahara Reporters has uncovered that Senator Monday Okpebholo, the All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate in the forthcoming Edo 2024 Governorship election, is not registered to vote in Edo State.

According to the information provided by Sen. Okpebholo in his Form EC9 affidavit, sworn on March 5, 2024, at the Federal High Court in Abuja and later published by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), his full name is Monday Okpebholo, born on August 29, 1970, in Irrua, Esan Central Local Government.

However, repeated checks on INEC’s official voter verification portal (https://cvr.inecnigeria.org/vvs) revealed that Sen. Okpebholo’s name does not appear on the voter list for any of the 18 local governments in Edo State, including his local government of Esan Central. The portal consistently returned a “Voter Not Found” message for the Senator.

This discovery casts doubt on the authenticity of the voter’s card that Sen. Okpebholo submitted to INEC as part of his Form EC9 documentation. While voter registration is not a constitutional requirement to run for Governor or Senator, presenting a potentially forged card could expose the candidate to criminal litigation and post-election legal challenges.

With the INEC continuous Voter Registration process for 2024 now closed, there is no opportunity for the Senator or his political party to rectify this situation before the September 21 Governorship elections.

Attempts to contact Sen. Monday Okpebholo for comments were unsuccessful, as his phone number was unreachable at the time of publication.