The biometric registration of eligible voters for the 2012 December 7 elections got underway across the country last Saturday, but with problems, some of which may be teething.

While some registration centers experienced technical challenges with registration machines, forcing many eligible voters to abandon the exercise in frustration, only a few people converged at some centers without problems, to register.

For example, in the Agotime-Ziope District, in the Volta Region, machines at four out of the 13 registration centers experienced breakdowns, only one hour into the start of registration.

Generally, voters registration started very late at many Polling Stations, while at other places, officials were late in sending registration materials; by 8:30am on Saturday, materials such as lamination materials, among others, had not got to some of the centers, with the result that at one centre only two people had been registered by 5pm. At another center in Accra, only one person had been registered by 8:40am.

Indeed, the exercise started late in many stations and the process of registration was very sluggish for a very successful exercise. The situation persisted at many centers yesterday. Voters complained about the fingerprinting machines which, according to them, took at least 30 minutes to capture each participant’s fingerprints.

To achieve a good result at the end of the exercise, it is important for officials at the Electoral Commission (EC) to listen to the complaints of the electorate, delegate their men to the various centers to monitor what is happening there and to correct the various problems that emerged in the first three days of the exercise and what may happen in the future.

The EC must make sure that materials needed for the registration in other parts of the country, yet to have their turn, are delivered on time to avoid unnecessary extension of time.

What happened last Saturday and Sunday at some of the stations is not satisfactory at all, regarding the performance of EC staff, in the delivery of registration materials.

For the eligible voters, The True Statesman wishes to appeal to all to remain resolved to have their names recorded in the 2012 voters register by joining the queues to register.

The current exercise is the only opportunity they have to vote on December 7 this year and at any other time until another opportunity comes again. They must be happy that the registration will last 10 days in each polling station.

We also appeal to voters to observe all the electoral rules concerning the registration, and remind them that it is an offence to register twice or attempt to do so.

*The True Statesman* also wants to remind the political parties that the exercise is aimed at compiling a new register for the December 7 polls, and just as the EC is deploying as many as 45, 000 officials to the 7,000 polling stations in the country, they too must make sure that their representatives show up at the polling stations all the time, and on time, to avoid needles complaints.

A disturbing report coming from Ashanti says that some machomen have been going from polling station to polling station, disrupting the process in the region. We think that this needs immediate action, and we urge officials of the EC and the security agencies there to investigate the matter thoroughly so as to have incident- free biometric registration in all centers.

This is the only way we can have a clean biometric voters register for 2012.

The True Statesman

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