Maravi

UPND Nkana chair questions under-18 voter registration

UPND Nkana chair questions under-18 voter registration
By Mwila Chansa in Kitwe
Tue 29 June 2010, 04:30 CAT

UPND Nkana Constituency chairman Chinyemba Kambanja has observed that the Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ)’s announcement that even people who will be 18 years by July 2011 can register as voters now is in contravention of the law.

And Kambanja said sentiments by ECZ chairperson Justice Florence Mumba that political parties are not doing enough to sensitise people on the ongoing voter registration exercise are unfair.

In a walk-in interview at the Post Newspapers office in Kitwe yesterday, Kambanja said it was misleading for the ECZ to suggest that even people that would turn 18 years by July 2011 could register as voters now because the law clearly stipulated who qualified to register as a voter.

“Their Act, the electoral Act number 12 of 2006 under section five clearly spells out the qualifications for one to register as a voter,” he said. “It stipulates in black and white that one has to be 18 or above in order to register as a voter. There is nowhere it says one can register in anticipation that they will be 18 years old.”

Section five of the electoral Act under qualification for registration as a voter reads: ‘(i) subject to provisions of section seven, every person shall be qualified for registration as a voter in direct elections - (a) if he or she is a citizen of Zambia, (b) has attained the age of 18 years, (c) is in possession of a green National Registration Card.'

Kambanja urged the ECZ to target the right people in the voter registration exercise because any compromise could lead to wrongdoing.

“This is how wrong things start and if we are not careful, we might extend the voter registration to non-Zambians on grounds that they have lived in Zambia for many years even when the law does not allow,” he said.

“We have a by-law for example, which states that no person under the age of 18 can enter a bar or a drinking place, so one cannot say that I will enter a bar since I will be 18 in the next two months.”

Kambanja said if there was any other law in the Act that allowed people below 18 years to register, then that part or section of the law was in dire contradiction with the principle electoral Act and should be considered null and void.

Labels: CHINYEMBA KAMBANJA, FLORENCE MUMBA, UPND

posted by MrK @ 1:22 PM