Saturday, 11 October 2008

The NEC invites voters to check their registration

Cambodge Soir

09-10-2008

The National Election Committee has launched an awareness campaign concerning the update of voting lists, with the support of the Ministry of Information.

The voting lists will be checked between the 1st and the 20th of October, in preparation for the next elections in 2012. For this purpose, the NEC wants the voters to check their registration or to proceed to do so with the village or district authorities. A first communiqué of 16 September already requested all citizens to think about this procedure.

The NEC, through the Ministry of Information, has recently asked the media to broadcast this communiqué to the attention of people of voting age and to all services concerned.

According to Im Sousdey, President of the Committee, the update of the voting lists is a very important step in the voting procedure and it’s the responsibility of the people involved to update them, particularly for those who moved house or for those who reached the voting age. He also asked NGO’s and politicians for their participation in observing these different steps.

Uon Sovichheka, Secretary of Depo I district of Phnom Penh, reveals that until Thursday 9 October, only 22 people came to register. He has the feeling that few people make the effort to verify their registration. “Even if we post a large sign in front of the district office, if village chiefs inform the residents, very few people show interest”, says Sovichheka, who states having only received four people per day but that these numbers should increase towards the end of the year, as it was the case during the previous years.

The secretary of another Phnom Penh neighbourhood regrets that there’s little cooperation from the political parties. “They’re blaming our work but not one politician came to see what is happening in the neighbourhood. There would be fewer problems if they helped us to inform the voters”, he specified.

No comments: