National Assembly Speaker Peter Katjavivi last week brought to the National Assembly the Electoral Commission of Namibia’s budget of N$85.3 million for consideration and approval.
The bulk of the funds – N$45.1 million – motivated by Katjavivi is to be allocated for personnel expenditure while N$40.2 million is for non-personnel expenditure.
According to Katjavivi, the electoral body’s budget includes three critical programs: election administration, voter and civic education, as well as policy coordination and support services. For the administration of elections, he said, an amount of N$23.6 million has been allocated to cater for the procurement of goods and other services, including all election-related expenditures.
“The ECN, through this program, conducts and facilitates the participation of voters in regular free and fair elections. During the 2022/23 financial year, the commission will focus on enhancing its electoral operations by reviewing the voter registration processes and systems, logistics management systems and facilities,” Katjavivi said.
In return, according to him, this will ensure greater operational efficiency as ECN prepares for the next electoral cycle.
Similarly, he said, an amount of N$1.9 million has been made available for operational activities, while an additional budgetary allocation of N$20.4 million has been availed for the replacement of the Biometric Voter Registration equipment and the trial run of the said equipment in preparation for the general registration of voters in 2024.
“ECN procured a Biometric Voters Registration System (BVRS) in 2013 that was introduced and deployed for the first time in 2014, during the third general registration of voters (GRV) exercise. The system comprises 904 laptops and 904 printer kits, referred to as mobile voter registration kits (MVRKs),” he said.
Before the introduction of this system, Katjavivi said the credibility of the national voters’ register has been legally contested as confirmed by multiple court applications lodged by various political parties prior to the conduct of previous elections.
As provided for in terms of the regional council’s act, Katjavivi said, during this financial year, an amount of N$1.9 million has been availed for the conduct of at least one by-election.
In the scenario where more than one vacancy occurs, Katjavivi said the additional funding would be required to enable the ECN to conduct requisite by-elections.
“It is worth mentioning that the conduct of a single by-election will cost approximately N$2.5 million,” he said.
Katjavivi also informed MPs that N$4.7 million has been set aside for voter and civic education as well as information distribution.
Additionally, he stated an amount of N$11. 7 million has been allocated to the policy coordination, and supervision and support services programme to cater for non-personnel expenditures, which is for the procurement of goods and other services.
This, according to him, includes rental, license renewals, commission and boards expenditure, electoral reports, as well as membership fees to regional and international electoral bodies, amongst others.