Constituents complain over unavailability of provisional list with concerns over time limitation
By Gary Hatigeva
ISLANSUN Sun has over the past few days been receiving a good number of concerns and complaints from constituents, claiming they have not received or seen any activity for the providence of the Provisional List.
Constituents in East Kwaio of Malaita, including a few from the Western province, have reported that they were aware of the timeframe indicated by the Solomon Islands Electoral Commission (SIEC) for the availability of the list, which was expected to start on October 29.
But concerns revealed that “to date [yesterday], there has not been any official around to execute the pinning up program of the Commission of the provisional list”.
This was something the Commission was also made aware of, and a follow up on Friday revealed that they too have been informed of these concerns, and are working closely with officers that were sent out to pin up these lists.
When contacted on this, Philothea Paul of the Commission confirmed that they have also received the similar complaints, but explained that the provisional voter lists have been dispatched to all provinces and should be pinned up in every polling station within the constituencies.
She outlined that the timeframe for pinning up the voter list is from Oct 29 up until Nov 4, and anyone who has not seen the list is advised to keep looking out when the officers will come around and pin up the list.
She said registration officers are there in the field with the list and with two more days still remaining, they are expecting to have the entire list up for viewing by November 4 and assured that people will still have the chance to view the list before the other phase as SIEC is still on schedule.
“The list will remain in all the constituencies for viewing from November 4 up until November 20 and everyone to take their time to check the list and awaits Omission and Objection period which starts on Nov 7 to start lodging in their complaints with Registration Officers for their respective constituencies.”
Meanwhile when questioned, the SIEC official clarified that the only factors that could hamper SIEC processes is logistic, finances and bad weather, “otherwise as said earlier, the list are out there and should be pinned up before November 4”.
“There is no reason seen to be of benefit for intending candidates to have interest in inferring in this processes.
“The list is intended for the public to inspect as part of the legal procedure that must be fulfilled before a final voter list can be compiled.
“And voters, candidates and political parties should help scrutinise and allow the process to ensue,” the SIEC Head of Media and Communications Awareness explained when questioned on the possibilities for the lists to be tempered with or manipulated.
However, people are concerned that there is a chances those who have strong influences particularly, intending candidates or their agents, in the system or over officers, can interfere for the sake of keeping names that might have higher chances of being objected.
“Especially, with regards to the mass cross-border registration that was done under the registration centres in Honiara, most of which registered for constituencies in the provinces,” one of the concerned constituents in Malaita shared when contacting this paper on Friday.
