Voter registration starts in Iringa this weekend - NEC.

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NEC chairman Damian Lubuva.

The National Electoral Commission (NEC) will this weekend start registering Iringa region’s potential voters in the permanent voters’ registration book.

 

Speaking to this paper in his office yesterday, the Iringa municipality registration officer, Gabriel Msunza, said the exercise will use the Biometric Voter Registration (BVR) kits. 

 

He expected that all potential voters would be registered within the planned period in the 192 identified registration centres in Iringa Region. 

 

Saying they expected to receive 49 BVR kits from NEC for the exercise, he explained:

 

“We expect to complete the exercise in 28 days and we are very optimistic that the 49 BVR kits will be enough for all the two million people in our region.”  He said they were well prepared to overcome challenges like those which occurred during the registration exercise in Njombe Region.

 

However, a potential voter, Rajab Abdalah, felt that the 28 days were not enough because Iringa Region has more people than Njombe Region. 

 

He said with the small population in Njombe the exercise took more than 50 days. Thus it is very possible that the exercise may not be successful in Iringa Region.

 

“It is not possible to register all the people in 28 days…the population here is very big compared to that of Njombe,” said Abdallah. 

 

Early this week, the NEC announced that it had received 1,600 BVR kits.

 

NEC chairman Damian Lubuva told journalists that his office had received 248 kits that would be used in training NEC officials ahead of the start of registration in Iringa, Lindi, Ruvuma and Mtwara on April 24.

 

According to him, another set of 1,600 kits was expected to arrive at the Julius Nyerere International Airport (JNIA) in Dar es Salaam this week.

 

“We will thereafter receive 1,152 kits that will be sent to Singida, Tabora, Kigoma and Kagera regions on a date that will be communicated later,’’ Lubuva said.

 

The NEC boss said his office had no plan to postpone this year’s General Election in October. He warned politicians not to make statements that had not got even an iota of truth.