KAMPALA – This Chairperson of Electoral Commission Justice Simon Byabakama has revealed that all Ugandans interested in taking part in the 2021 general elections will not be required to present their national Identification cards before they are registered as long as they prove their nationality.
Byabakama made the revelation while flagging off the update of the national voters’ Register for 2021 general elections at Kira Road playground in Kamwokya-Kampala.
“The important thing at this update is are you a citizen or are you 18years and above if you can furnish evidence that you are 18years and above, details of your parents, the LC Chairperson confirms I believe you will be registered,” said Byabakama.
He also promised to write to the National Identification Registration Authority (NIRA) and ask them to drop the National Identification cards that haven’t been picked by citizens down to parishes across the country.
Byabakama said, “I am going to communicate to NIRA to ensure that since we are having the update exercise going on we can have these national IDs which haven’t been picked to parishes so that people find it easy to pick up these national IDs.”
The Commission boss said the voters’ update that is taking place should be used as an avenue by Ugandans to determine their next leaders instead of blaming the Commission when some of the duly elected leaders failed to live to the expectations of their voters.
He explained, “It is your right as a citizen to participate in voting in an electoral process either as a voter of candidate but now, if you say, I am not, it is your choice, but we are encouraging Ugandans don’t blame anyone but yourself when you start complaining, grumbling that I didn’t want this leader to come into office, you should go and express that at the polling station, you start now.”
It should be recalled that the Electoral Commission last week launched the general updates of the national voters register for the 2020/2021 general elections exercise.
Byabakama said the process is intended to enable voters to confirm their registration details, the commission will display at each update station the register of each polling station within the respective parish/ward and during this exercise, the commission will register eligible citizens of Uganda who are 18yrs and above but haven’t yet registered starting today, 21st November to 11th December 2019.
The Commission has set aside UGX32B for the exercise of General Voters Register Update and during the update exercise, registered voters who wish to transfer to new voting locations will be able to apply for such transfer.
