The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | Inconsistencies in the verification of voters are affecting the on-going voter’s register update exercise in Masaka district.
Despite the Electoral Commission extending the deadline twice for the exercise, many people in Masaka district are yet to verify their voter eligibility.
Swaibu Makumbi, the chairperson of Masaka social rights defenders network, argues that the exercise is being affected by lack of common practices to guide its effectiveness.
He explains that many people who are seeking transfers to new polling stations are finding it hard to have their requests processed at the update centres due to the long bureaucratic tendencies, which has demoralized the public.
Makumbi says that while at some registration centres, applicants are allowed to simply present their voter numbers to process their transfers, others are asked to present introduction letters from their previous villages of residence which is costly to many people especially those that reside in distant places.
Anthony Ssenoga, a voter at a register update station at Butego ward in Masaka municipality revealed that he has been trying to transfer his polling station in vain.
Ssenoga is equally afraid that such tiresome and unclear tendencies are likely to disenfranchise many youths from participating in the forthcoming elections.
URN visited some registration and verification centres in Masaka and indeed not many names in the registers had been ticked.
But Sam Agaba Rutemba, the Electoral Commission’s Registrar for Masaka district says part of what has been described as frustrating process are just stringent conditions put in place to avert irregular transfer of voters by selfish politicians who are fond of abusing the exercise.
He blamed the low turn-up to public’s reluctance and preferring to show-up at the end of the exercise, adding that they discouraged their update staff from acting on presumptions to tick people’s names in absenter.
The Electoral Commission begun the general register update exercise on November 21th, but it has for the third time extended the deadline to December 23th.
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