- In a televised interview in South Africa, UDC president Duma Boko reiterates the party’s position that IEC is denying them access to voters’ roll and registration
BONGANI MALUNGA
The Umbrella for Democratic Change (UDC) president Duma Boko has reiterated the opposition collective’s position that they are being denied access to the voters’ roll and registration by the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC). IEC has denied the reports on numerous occasions but Boko doubled down on the opposition’s view in a televised interview on SABC News last Wednesday.
Serious challenges
“There are many reasons why we are not happy. Number one, we faced a serious challenge during the voter registration exercise when we demanded that all the political parties and all interested players be allowed to observe the process of registrations. The IEC refused. We went to court to challenge this, we were saying that the law does not prohibit but the democratic ethic impels that we be allowed to observe. The courts took the view that we couldn’t observe the registration process,” Boko said in the interview.
Mountains of paper
“The second problem is that the so called Independent Electoral Commission has refused to provide us with an electronic version of the voters’ roll to enable us to undertake an extensive and thorough examination of the roll preferring to give us hard copies. You can imagine having to examine mountains of paper in relation to slightly over one million voters. That is a huge challenge, that has also incensed us and it is an indication of the inability of the so called Independent Electoral Commission to conduct a free and fair election. It exposes their bias, it exposes the fact that they are not as independent as they purport,” Boko continued.
Failed consultation
Boko stated that efforts to engage the IEC for consultative talks have been unsuccessful despite their best efforts. “We have consistently engaged with them through written letters. They are impervious to anything that is remotely pushing towards free and fair elections, so they are intransigent and they are unwilling to cooperate and render free and fair elections,” the UDC leader explained.
Way forward
The UDC concluded by stating that the opposition collective has adopted an approach that will convert the manual voters’ roll into an electronic version but it will be a costly and time consuming exercise.
Boko stated that they will train and deploy election observers referring to them as “defenders of the vote, they are a very formidable contingent that is ready to ensure that there is effective monitoring of the electoral system and processes on the day of elections and all the way towards the counting and delivery of results.”