Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) has assured Malawians that voters whose photographs are missing in the voter’s register will not be sent back.
This was said by MEC’s Chairperson Justice Dr Jane Ansah at Central Office Information on Tuesday.
Ansah said that out of the 5,002 centres, there are a total of 398 centres containing voters with missing photographs.
She added that most of these centres have one or two voters with missing photographs.
According to Ansah, after the conclusion of the voter registration exercise the Commission requested National Registration Bureau (NRB) to be furnished with the missing photographs and they were only able to retrieve and provide around 1,500 photographs which have since been uploaded in MEC’s system.
NRB said that it does not possess both the photographs and National IDs for the remaining voters with missing photographs and would have to recapture these people but the exercise cannot happen before the polling day.
“The Commission had no choice other than proceeding with the printing of the voters register in this state. The Commission is assuring everyone who registered, if there are names appearing without a picture they will still be allowed to vote. No one will be sent back. Monitors in these polling stations will have to be vigilant and hence the need to identify monitors from the same area,” she said.
On transport, Ansah said the commission needs 2,154 vehicles, 3 aircrafts and 6 boats to effectively and efficiently distribute materials and deploy staff in all 5,002 polling stations as well as reverse logistics.
Out of the 2,154 vehicles requirement, 600 are trucks. Government has since released K300 million for the Commission for MEC to hire trucks which they could not get from government ministries and departments.
