ROUGH START FOR VOTER REGISTRATION EXERCISE

MBABANE – In the first day of the 2018 voter registration exercise, confusion summarised what happened on the day and five years later, a rough start was witnessed again.

The 2023 voter registration exercise, which marked the second leg of the national elections, did not have a smooth start for many communities. Yesterday, the Elections and Boundaries Commission (EBC) kick-started the voter registration exercise across the country, following the civic and voter education exercise. The commission published over 500 registration sites that people could use to register for the 2023 national elections. It was communicated that all voting stations would be open by 8am yesterday. However, most centres were not up and running by 8am. Most registration sites under Mbabane West Inkhundla did not have a single officer from the EBC to carry out the registration.

Operating

The constituency had nine published sites, but none of them were operating by 8am. One of the sites that was visited was AMICAALL Centre and there was no sign of a single officer or electorate.  Another site that was visited was Mangwaneni Primary School and Mbabane Central High School, where there was no signs of any registration exercise that was taking place.
When the head teachers of these schools were asked where the registration was taking place since their schools were listed as centres, they were surprised by this. They stated that they were not aware that their schools were selected as voter registration centres. The Red Cross centre at Mahwalala had some activity when visited around 8:40am, though only senior members of the community also known as imisumpe were found there. They stated that they were also waiting for the team from EBC that was supposed to conduct the exercise.

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