Sawi Hausiku

RUNDU – The Electoral Commission of Namibia in Kavango West is visiting all eight constituencies to identify suitable areas to establish registration or polling venues ahead of next year’s Presidential and National Assembly elections.

ECN regional voter education officer Petrus Malengi told Nampa on Monday that the exercise started in August, in which they completed three constituencies - Ncuncuni, Ncamagoro and Kapako.

No extra staff have been employed as the exercise is being done by ECN’s regional staff members, Malengi said.

The second phase started on 10 September and will run until 24 September.

“We are visiting old registration points as well and we have noticed that we have to remove some as people have relocated from these areas. Some areas in the past only had a few people living there, now there are more than 10 homesteads, thus we will have to identify them as registration points,” he stated.

Malengi said the process of identifying suitable polling stations is informed by various factors such as locality, topographic features, population sizes, population density, vastness as well as distance and accessibility.

He said in terms of Section 89 of the Electoral Act, the commission must establish one or more stations at convenient places within a constituency for voters to cast their votes.

Malengi said he will provide the total number of polling stations identified at a later stage.

-Nampa