Chadema’s claims have come a day after the National Electoral
Commission (NEC) admitted that it is possible it might fail to complete
registering voters biometrically before the referendum date.
Speaking to reporters yesterday in Dar es Salaam, Chadema Deputy
Secretary General John Mnyika (pictured) said the party has managed to
intercept communication between the national electoral body and IPSITI,
the supplier company, in which the latter informs NEC officials that it
is yet to rectify the faults noted in the kits during the trials end of
last year.
That information suggests that NEC will fail to accomplish the task given the time left to the date of the referendum, he said.
Communication between NEC and IPSITI shows that despite that
earlier the BVR kits imported for trials worked with several challenges
and NEC promised to sort them out, until now nothing has been solved.
Mnyika said that they have managed to access reliable
communication indicating delay in modifying BVR kits since January as
until now the kits have not been modified.
“Due to that delay we are hesitating to believe that NEC will
accomplish the task according to the time allocated as the time left is
too short,” he said.
NEC will start registering eligible voters in Njombe Region
tomorrow and the exercise take place up to March 25. “The electoral body
will spend more than a month in one region while there are more than 25
regions in the Mainland that will have to be covered in the remaining
period of roughly two months,” he declared, amazed at this expectation.
He also demanded that Prime Minister Mizengo Pinda and NEC chairman
Justice Damian Lubuva tell the public the truth about BVR kits, as
NEC is set to fail to accomplish the task accordingly we.
“Although NEC is hindering them to tell the public the shortcomings
of the BVR kits that should not stop them telling the public the truth
about those kits,” he said.
However, he added that, since NEC has failed to educate the public
on BVR kits, political parties will continue campaigning on BVR kits to
the general public, and for us we will tell the public both good and
shortcomings of the kits.
“Top officials believe that by telling the public shortcomings of
BVR kits this could result in misunderstandings in the country. But we
will tell the public so that we can rescue them from such
misunderstandings,” he stated.
“We will not be quiet at all, so as to rescue the country from
unnecessary problems. Instead we want the premier and NEC to tell the
public what is really taking place,” he emphasized.
“During the 18th parliamentary meeting, we raised a motion on BVR
kits and it was agreed that NEC would meet with political parties. The
meeting was held but important questions were not answered,” he stated.
The bipartisan parliamentary leadership committee met in Dodoma and
discussed the matter and agreed that the committee will meet with NEC
but until now no further meeting has been held.
NEC is asking political parties to mobilize people to come out to
register but does not wish that the parties address problems with the
BVR kits, which endangers effective registration of voters.
“Surprisingly we sent a letter to the central police station informing
them that we will have a public rally in Njombe region but they ordered
that the rally should not be held,” he said.
The police said it could not allow the meeting as the BVR
registration process was expected to be taking place there at that time,
he said.
Despite the police ban they will hold a meeting as the party plans
to launch RtoR BVR (Region by Region) discussion on BVR kits.
“We are planning to launch our new operation on BVR kits identified
as RtoR so that we can emphasize to the public on what to expect in
BVR-based voter registration,” he declared.
On Thursday, NEC chairman Justice Lubuva said in Dar es Salaam that
the extent to which they can register voters depends entirely on the
number of BVR kits they receive. “I am confident that the registration
will end before the day of the referendum,” he stated. “We will let the
country know if this is not achieved within the given timeline.”
NEC would not hold the referendum before updating its register to
ensure that all 23.9 million eligible voters have the time and
opportunity to be included in the new register, he affirmed.
Opposition leaders and even ruling party officials have expressed
worries on the issue, declaring that NEC will be to blame if things go
wrong with the BVR-based registration process.
NEC warned political parties about evading registration using
suspicions of BVR kits as an excuse for disturbances in the coming voter
registration process.
Justice Lubuva said that the exercise involves providing education
to regional coordinators and voter registration officials on
improvements needed in the permanent voters’ registration book.
Leaders of political parties were unhappy with the exercise and
have been trying to express dissatisfaction over the technology since
then, the NEC chairman added.
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