10 Sep 2024

The general election voters’ rolls are expected to be available for anybody interested in purchasing them from Friday.

In a press release, the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) says it has started amalgamating all the voters’ registration rolls into one.

The IEC says the general voters’ registration roll, first supplementary voters’ registration roll as well as the second and last supplementary voters’ registration rolls produced the election rolls. 

It says following the consolidation of the rolls and the coming into operation of election roll, any previous general and supplementary rolls will cease to have effect and will be destroyed.

It also says the amalgamation of the rolls is one of the most critical activities in electoral management and follows the issuance of a writ of elections.

“Consequently, it has to be done with the highest level of sensitivity and circumspection to avoid instances where some voter’s names are misplaced during the process,” reads the release. It further says once the amalgamation is completed satisfactorily, the election roll will be placed for inspection by those interested at the office of the secretary to the IEC in Gaborone, all IEC district offices, district commissioners’ offices and council secretaries or town clerks offices. 

The IEC says it will also provide copies of polling district (council ward) election rolls at some dikgotla in each constituency for anybody resident there to participate effectively in the process, if they desire to so.

“It has to be noted that the purported inspection of the election roll is not necessarily another opportunity to raise objections,” it adds. It says objections were raised, ventilated and concluded during the inspection before the general and supplementary voters’ rolls were certified, hence the current inspection is therefore meant for the voters to appreciate the election roll before the general election and in the process, promoting transparency in the whole electoral management.

Moreover, it says minor administrative errors that do not involve movement of voters may still be considered and corrected depending on their nature. On other issues, IEC says it is issuing duplicate voter registration cards at all its offices to any voter who may have lost their card.

It further says in terms of section 29 of the Electoral Act, the issuance of such cards will continue until the end of business on October 29, adding the law, however, does not allow the IEC to issue duplicate voters’ registration cards on the day of the elections.

Meanwhile, the IEC says it commits to delivering this year’s general election within the confines of the existing legal framework and therefore invites all voters and other stakeholders to commit to the same undertaking. ENDS