Electoral Commission

Secretary Lupari says that has been numerous Election steering committee meetings to date which have involved representatives of  relevant stakeholders.

He also says that come  April 11, there will be a conference for department heads and provincial administrators.

At this proposed meet, the Electoral Commissioner and the steering committee will brief all the heads on the planning process and engage in discussion so that they can provide input in the election plan being prepared.

However, O’Neill said it will take a lengthy process.

He said the government has already established the Electoral Boundaries Commission which comes under the supervision of the Electoral Commissioner to look into the electoral boundaries.

“Once they visit all the electorates in the country, they will then report back to the government to make recommendations.”

He said the last electoral boundary report presented to parliament was in the last term of parliament that was rejected by Parliament because of some fault in the report.

Nelson Duwabane, the President of Country Party  said, “with the 2017 Elections some months away, we want the Government to revise the OLIPPAC and the Organic Law on National and LLG Elections to ensure we have smooth elections.

“The Provincial Reforms have disabled good debate in the Provincial Assembly and the LLG. The governor and president are the chairman and speaker and there’s no Opposition to scrutinize the provincial and Local Level Governments. 

This week elections managers from the highlands region gather at a workshop where they are going through the process of “roll cleansing”.

This is when Electoral Commission officials go through the electoral roll to remove ghost names, duplicates; names of voters who are deceased, under-age voters and so on.  

Southern region will start this exercise next week.

By March this year the rolls should be out for display throughout the country for the public to verify before it is returned to the provincial electoral offices.