Nudo youth press Government over date for election

THE youth leader of an opposition party has called on Government to announce the date of this year’s national and presidential elections as soon as possible.

Pro-Laste Ngueumenga, acting secretary for the Nudo Youth League in the Khomas Region, says this will give new voters more time to register and allow political parties ‘more time to campaign and organise their fundraising for that period’.
It has been the practice in Namibia for the Head of State to announce major election dates just two months in advance by way of the Government Gazette.
‘Voter apathy in Namibia has become a challenge in the past elections, especially in local and regional authority elections and in regional by-elections, the most recent one in Katutura’s Tobias Hainyeko constituency, where just 22 per cent of the voters cast their ballot three months ago,’ Ngueumenga said on Wednesday.
‘Supplementary registration for voters is usually done over just a few weeks during election years and new eligible voters who have turned 18 years of age that year and people who have moved to another constituency must re-register, but often time is too short to do that,’ Ngueumenga told The Namibian after a press conference on the issue.
Asked why his party did not start its election campaign earlier, before the announcement of the date, he responded that it was usual practice for political parties to only kick off their campaigns once the date was known.
Namibia is to hold national and presidential elections towards the end of this year. The terms of local and regional councils end in 2010, which would mean yet another election.
During the 1998 and 2004 municipal elections only 34 and 44 per cent of eligible voters cast their ballots. Voter turnout for regional elections improved a bit from 40 per cent in 1998 to 55 per cent in 2004.
National Assembly elections in 1999 drew 61 per cent of the voters and that increased to 85 per cent in 2004.
Presidential elections, which were held at the same time, jumped to 85 per cent in 2004, up from only 61 per cent in 1999.