On Tuesday INEC announced that 4,658 Permanent Voter Cards (PVC) were stolen during last week's distribution of PVC's in the 9 local government areas of Edo state.

The Resident Electoral Commissioner in the state, Mr. Baritor Kpagih, who made this known while briefing journalists on the outcome of the distribution exercise, said that the commission also lost 997 of the cards in Etsako West and Ovia North-East local government areas of the state.

He added that, 'We also want to put it on record that we were a bit disappointed that in spite of our appeal to all our people to recognise the fact that stealing and snatching of cards will be of no use because these cards can only be used by the card holder, such events still took place in a number of local government areas.

“The most disturbing is the one that took place in Orhrionmwon Local Government Area, where a total number of 3,661 cards were snatched from eight polling units.'

According to Kpagihthe total number of cards meant for the state could not be disclosed, as some of the cards brought to Edo were originally meant for eligible voters in Jigawa, Kogi and Delta states.