Africa-Press – Botswana. Councillors have emphasised the need for the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) to promptly address challenges it continues to face and provide enduring and useful guidance for the electorate.
They made the call at a special Ramotswa District Council meeting address by the IEC secretary, Mr Jefferson Siamisang recently to consult, reach out and engage all critical stakeholders on electoral matters.
Some reports had indicated that the IEC continued to face challenges including among others, the voters roll which captured voters’ information, transfer of voters, voter apathy and shortage of resources.
With the date for voters registration set for October 4-31, councillors opined that the IEC needed not to wait until the last minute to address such challenges.
Some councillors also advised the IEC to introduce stiffer penalties for politicians who were always fingered in unlawful acts of voter trafficking.
Nonetheless, they applauded efforts made by the IEC to update councils on the just-ended exercise to demarcate polling districts, which started in April with the aim to ensure redistribution of population in order to prevent imbalances across constituencies or polling districts.
The exercise was also intended to ensure accessibility of electoral processes such as registration and voting at the convenience of electorates.
The demarcation exercise had since seen four additional wards from the initial 13 to 17 established in the new Ramotswa District.
The four were established after Lesetlhana and Magopane wards were divided into Lesetlhana North and South, Taung East and West, Magopane East, West and Magope.
In his address, Mr Siamisang urged councillors to take part in the voter registration process and urge their electorates to participate in the electoral process as it was a fundamental right.
He said voter registration was an integral part of the voting process and required to be given the seriousness it deserved.
“The IEC has learned from the past challenges and we have now strengthened supervision of the voting process,” he said.
He said in the past, they were inundated with records of people registering more than once, flouting the residency principle of the IEC.
He added that they also have an election management system that was be used to generate and manage electoral data.
He thus urged stakeholders to encourage voters to register at their principal place of residence, adding in the event of movement or change of residence, they were allowed to make arrangements with election officials to transfer their registration after satisfying the officials with reasons for their decision.
“Failure to register at the principal residency always leads to voter trafficking and this is unlawful and punishable by law,” Mr Siamisang said.
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