Opposition cry foul over voters' roll

Opposition parties in Namibia are crying foul after allegedly receiving an incomplete voters’ roll only days before the country's general elections.

The issue came to light on Thursday after the director of elections, Philemon Kanime, told a briefing of election observers from the African Union and the Southern African Development Community that the list of registered voters had been available for public inspection since 14 October at various law courts in all 13 regions of the country.

A representative from an association of NGO's rose to comment that this was not the case.

"Where was it made public and why are the political parties and we, from the Namibian NGO Forum [NANGOF], unaware of the roll being available for public scrutiny?" Pauline Dempers, vice-chairperson of NANGOF, questioned Kanime in the meeting.

The National Society for Human Rights (NSHR) claimed at the same briefing that political parties only received copies of the voters’ roll on Wednesday, minus the lists of five of the country’s 13 political regions.

"This has to be proven," Kanime replied to Phil ya Nangoloh, executive director of the NSHR.

The national chairman of the oppositional Congress of Democrats (CoD) party, Tsudao Gurirab, who is also the party's election manager showed IRIN the five boxes with copies of the roll which comprised thousands of loose sheets.

"The roll of the most populous regions are missing, they are the Khomas, Okavango, Otjozondjupa, Omusati and Oshana regions," Gurirab alleged.

"How can we now check the roll and verify it or report mistakes, let alone getting copies before the elections to all our party offices in the various regions?" he complained.

"By law the political parties must receive the voters’ roll 21 days before the election date," Gurirab added.

An official at the Electoral Commission of Namibia (ECN) admitted that they could only send out the remaining lists to the parties on Friday.

"Printing out the lists takes such a long time," said the official, who spoke under the condition of anonymity. Asked why the list was not made available in an electronic form, the official merely said: "The roll will not be made available on CD-ROM."

CoD vice-chairperson, Nora Schimming-Chase, warned that the ECN's failure had opened the door to the possibility of electoral fraud.

"There must be a reason why the list is not made available electronically. I suspect that we opposition parties are purposefully prevented from scrutinizing the list," she told IRIN.

"The figure of 977,742 registered voters is too high, half the population. According to the 2001 census, 40 percent of the Namibian population is below 15 years of age," she added.

"The ECN printed 1.8 million ballot papers for the national and 1.8 million ballot papers for the presidential elections, virtually double the required figures. There is no immediate audit of the ballot books and this leaves room for cheating," Schimming-Chase alleged.

Albert Kandjii, acting administrative secretary of the Democratic Turnhalle Alliance (DTA) the official opposition, echoed the concerns of the CoD.

"We have been asking for copies of the voters’ roll for the past month at the weekly meetings all contesting parties have with the ECN, but were constantly told the list was not ready."

Namibia goes to the polls on 15 and 16 November in elections that mark the end of the democratic rule of President Sam Nujoma, the veteran leader of the ruling SWAPO party, who this year handed party leadership to Hifikepunye Pohamba. SWAPO has won every election since independence in 1990.