NEC preached on cost ethics by religious leaders

By Aisia Rweyemamu

NEC Chairman retired Justice,Damian Lubuva

The National Elections Commission (NEC) yesterday met in Dar es Salaam with religious leaders to discuss different mechanisms needed to ensure free and fair election ahead of civil polls and general elections.

Among other things discussed, religious leaders proposed a rescheduling of the voting day, stopping the use of teachers as registration officials   and reducing costs by using the data collected by the National Identification Agency (NIDA).


Speaking during the conference, Rev. Godlisten Moshi of CCT questioned NEC and NIDA registration activities saying they are similar and should therefore be joined together to reduce costs.

He said NIDA and NEC were conducting registration activities over the same area, same country and same people whereby that information can be placed before NEC. Mohamed Hamis Said, a Bakwata representative questioned the commission over the new registration system known as Biometric Voter Registration (BVR) by asking if it will not deny some religious rights during the picturing process.

Also religious leaders sought from the government to declare what are the boundaries between religion and politics since the government told them to not involve themselves with politics at the same time they ask for their assistance.

Bernard Kingo, a pastor from the Evangelistic Assemblies of God Tanzania (EAGT) proposed to the commission to change the voting day as it is not supposed to be a worshipping day.

Pastor Kingo said the voting day should be at mid week and be declared as a public holiday.

Reverend Agutu Juma Oballa of the Menonite Church told the commission that they should change the system of using teachers during the registration process. Instead they should use unemployed people so as to expand the scope of casual employment available.

Rev. Oballa proposed that NEC should use qualified people found in specific areas where the exercise takes place such as graduates.

Earlier in his opening speech, NEC Chairman retired Justice Damian Lubuva said the commission has already conducted verification of registration centers which include villages and urban wards, saying they have increased from 24,919 centers in 2005 to 40,015 at present.

NEC is set to re-register eligible voters through Biometric Voter Registration (BVR) technology in order to address the challenges of using the Optical Mark Recognition system.

Through BVR technology biological information or behavior will be collected and stored in a database for identification.

The exercise is scheduled to start in the next two months, with about Tsh298bn expected to be spent on the exercise, he added.
 

SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN