Voter registration chaos

Correction

ON the front page of The Namibian today, a photograph of Permanent Secretary, Beuta Ua-Ndjarakana was erroneously placed with the article on ‘Voter registration chaos’, instead of that of Moses Ndjarakana, the Director of Elections. We regret the error which will also be corrected in the Monday, September 21 edition of the newspaper.

‘OUTRAGED.’ That’s how Elections Director Moses Ndjarakana described the public’s response to yesterday’s chaos after supplementary voter registration failed to get off the ground in most parts of the country.

By yesterday afternoon tons of voter registration material, many printers for voter cards and almost half of the 716 vehicles needed to transport the material were still missing in action.Ndjarakana blamed a strike by customs officials at the Oliver Tambo International Airport in South Africa as well as the slow release of vehicles by different ministries for the no-show of many registration officials at tens of registration points yesterday.Thousands of people all over the country were met by empty halls as they visited various registration points and one political source said it could cost the Electoral Commission of Namibia up to N$500 000 to bring in some of the materials by road.’WE’RE SORRY’Ndjarakana downplayed it, however, saying that the companies who tendered for the registration and election material will carry the transport costs.’We know some people walked long distances to register. I do apologise to the nation and commit that as ECN we will do our best. We are asking everyone to stay calm. We will rectify at all costs,’ he said.All political parties were briefed about the situation yesterday.Their main worry was the setback for the time needed for registration and also the impact it will have on further processes such as the inspection of the voters’ roll as well as the actual election dates.Originally the registration was supposed to end on September 30 and the inspection of the voters’ roll expected to last from October 12 to 16.’We have got two weeks two rectify the situation but we will assess the impact and with political parties sit around the table and determine remedial measures like to increase the number of officials or hours they work,’ Ndjarakana said.By yesterday at 17h00 some of the constituencies had not received the registration material and many officials were sitting around idle at assembly points waiting for vehicles to arrive.’We have received the vehicles at a slower pace than we expected but the situation is improving now. We hope that by tonight we will have received most vehicles through the Ministry of Works,’ a visibly irritated Ndjarakana said.He said they had received many calls from outraged members of the public but their hands were tied.Reginald Roman, leader of the young wing of the United Democratic Front, said from Khorixas that people at Khorixas, Kamanjab, Epupa, Opuwo and Sesfontein were furious.Some people, like farmworkers, took special leave to register but had to go back after waiting for hours without seeing election officials.’Will the ECN allocate one extra day because of the first day that has been wasted,’ Roman asked.As a born-free who was supposed to register for the first time, he was particularly excited but left deflated after hours of waiting.’I wanted to do a symbolic registration by being the first person to register in Khorixas but was denied to exercise that right,’ he said.