Election roll time-lag causes some confusion
(CNS): Elections Supervisor Wesley Howell has said that the long gap between the deadline for registering to vote or making changes to elector details has impacted voters in today’s poll. A number of people have found themselves voting in constituencies where they no longer live and have not followed the campaigns, after finding their change of address details never made the list.
In some cases voters found that they were not able to vote at all, not realising that they had missed the 20 January deadline to make it onto the list being used for the General Election.
Howell told CNS that a few people had been impacted by the time lag. Even though the Elections Office had received details months ago, it was still too late to make this election list for a relatively small number of voters, he said.
Several voters were surprised to learn when they turned up to vote that they could not do so in the constituency they believed they had been registered. In several cases brought to the attention of CNS, the voters were directed back to their old districts, where they have had to vote for candidates that they have not paid attention to during the campaign and who will not represent their local interests.
Howell said that in each case the Elections Office received the change of address details from the voters and updated the change but it will not appear until the 1 July list.
He said he understood why people will find that confusing, given that some of them submitted their change of details just after 20 January and it is a long time between the submission period and the publication of the actual 1 April list that was used for this election.
“I have gotten specific complaints and the ones I have looked into, it is a timing issue,” he said. “Our deadline for voter registration is way in advance of the actual register coming out.”
Howell said that those voters had wrongly assumed that they were on the list or that their changes would be included on the 1 April list, but those changes will, in fact, be on 1 July list.
He said they had received a stack of changes and new voter applications after the 20 January deadline and a surge in applications after Nomination Day, but none of those people will appear on the register until 1 July, Howell confirmed.
“It’s a three month process and if you miss it by one day it becomes a six month process, which can be really confusing for folks,” he said.
Howell also confirmed that there have been a number of complaints about inducement and other allegations and they have all been passed to the police to be investigated.
“This is not a function of my office,” he said, explaining that unlike the Anti-Corruption Commission or the Commission for Standards in Public Life, his office has no investigatory mandate and is therefore required to alert the RCIPS.
Category: Election News
Excuses! That elector roll still shows people living in districts that they moved from years ago and includes people that the left the island DECADES ago!
They need to go through every single entry and verify details. Relying on objections to make corrections is completely ridiculous.
Understand the reason but this time lag needs to be cut. At least in half.