Clean the Elector’s lists and Issue Voter ID Cards, says Electoral Reform Effort Group
The Electoral Reform Effort Group, which comprises of Church, Business, Trade Unions and Civil Society leaders continues to reiterate the need to ensure that the necessary electoral reform respecting the cleansing of the electors lists and issuance of voter identification cards is pursued with the urgency necessary to obtain creditability in Dominica’s electoral process at the next general elections. The effort to maintain public peace cannot and should not be undervalued.
The Group notes that the Prime Minister has announced that general elections will be held in the Commonwealth of Dominica within one hundred (100) days from 13th October, 2019. The Prime Minister, by this announcement, has given the Electoral Commission ample notice to put its act together and to ensure that, within its declared six (6) week (42 days) timetable, that it enables the reform resulting in a sanitised electors lists and collection of data for issuance of voter ID cards by the House to House Re-verification of Electors exercise proposed in June 2018, and recommended by the Group and the Special Joint Mission. It may be understandable that the Prime Minister could have become impatient with the inconsistency, tardiness and erratic behaviour of the Electoral Commission in undertaking the work assigned to it under the Constitution of Dominica. Notwithstanding the Prime Minister’s announcement, the Group is of the firm view that the Electoral Commission, with almost 2½ times the time it said it needed to get the House to House Re-verification of Electors exercise completed, has ample time to implement the necessary electoral reforms.
The Electoral Commission has said that it had enough resources to undertake the process, and have previously declared that it received all the financing it requested from the Executive Branch of Government for its work.
Notwithstanding, the Group would find it incomprehensible that the Prime Minister and Minister of Finance, having declared a timeframe in which to hold the next general elections, would withhold any additional and necessary funding that the Electoral Commission would request in order to complete the House to House Re-verification of Electors exercise, especially knowing that it has been recommended by the Electoral Commission in June 2018, the Group in August 2019 and the Special Joint Mission in September 2019, as the most practical and achievable means of obtaining the necessary electoral reform before the general election.
This article is copyright © 2019 DOM767
