Voter who allegedly registered twice threatens legal action

SIONI ‘Aluta’ Iikela, who serves on Swapo’s Swakopmund district executive committee and was named as someone who appeared to have registered twice as a voter, wants to take NSRH Executive Director Phil ya Nangoloh and The Namibian to court for allegedly tarnishing his dignity in an article published last week.

He held a press conference on Tuesday at Swapo’s Erongo Region office to protest against the article headlined ‘More Voter Roll Discrepancies’, which was published on Friday.The report quoted Ya Nangoloh as saying that ‘a well-known Swapo activist, Sioni Iikela, and his wife, Tiofilia Inekela Iikela, apparently registered twice in September this year – once at Elim [in the Omusati Region] and shortly afterwards he registered again at Swakopmund and his wife at Arandis’.’I would like to categorically and comprehensively make it clear to Ya Nangoloh and the likes that I do not have a wife in my life until now, nor did I register twice this year … I would want to inform the public that in September I was not in the North even,’ Iikela said.According to Iikela, he registered in the Elim constituency in 2003 during the supplementary registration.’Since I have lost my 2003 voting card and have also moved from that constituency and stayed here in Swakopmund for a year and four months, by law I am allowed to register and vote for the regional and local councils of the town I am staying. Even the [alleged wife] that they are mentioning did not register twice.’According to him this ‘alleged wife’ has also moved from Elim to Arandis ‘where she stays now and has to register because she met the set criteria’.The Electoral Commission of Namibian (ECN) on Sunday charged that the NSHR’s claim that Iikela ‘and his wife’ registered in Omusati in 2003 and were issued with registration cards again in September this year was ‘conclusive evidence’ that the organisation had people in the ECN leaking information.The ECN said the two Iikelas ‘came for duplicates but not registration after the deadline’.The ECN statement reads: ‘Tiofilia Inekela Iikela and his wife Sioni Iikela [sic] were both issued with Voter Registration Cards for the first time on August 27 2003 while at Elim in the Omusati Region. They moved to Arandis in the Erongo Region where both applied for Registration Cards on the basis of change of address and they were registered accordingly on 27 September 2009.’Iikela said he appreciated ECN ‘for coming out in the clear’ although the elections body also referred to his ‘wife’.He gave Ya Nangoloh and The Namibian five working days to ‘restore his dignity’.