Some voters registered twice

Tue, Mar 28th 2017, 01:52 AM

Officials have found that some people have registered to vote for the approaching general election more than once, Parliamentary Commissioner Sherlyn Hall revealed yesterday.
"We have noticed that people have been registered twice, so we have to delete their cards," said Hall at the Parliamentary Registration Department on Farrington Road.
"They were registered at one station today; tomorrow with another station.
"Now, we have picked it up, but after the stuff has [already] been keyed into a computer database.
"So the computer picks it up.
"As I said earlier, that is dishonesty and I did refer a particular case to the police, where someone registered within five days, two different locations, same constituency, but different locations for the same polling division."
When asked whether it may have been the intention of the person to collect two voter's cards, Hall said, "Well you tell me. Why do you want to register twice? What does that tell you? Less than a week? That's dishonesty."
When asked whether there have been cases of people trying to register multiple times in different constituencies, Hall said no, but if it happens they would pick it up later.
"Mainly in the same constituency trying to register twice," he said.
Hall said this would be considered perjury under the voter registration oath.
"The oath book says, 'I swear that I am not registered in another constituency under current register'," he said.
"So if you sign an oath after you register the first time, that is perjury.
"He was committing perjury. So we will see [what will happen]."
Hall emphasized, "One man, one vote. One voter's card, one voter."
The parliamentary commissioner also said there have been reports of misplaced cards and cards that do not have the official seal on them.
To the misplaced cards issue, Hall said the cards were misfiled, insisting "we will find those".
To the missing seal issue, Hall said registration officers "are not pressing hard enough on the impression. So the seals are there, but it is very faint".
When asked whether there is any danger to the voting process if the seal is not on the cards, Hall said, "Well I don't know about the danger, but the person's name still appears on the register."
He said voters will still be able to vote even if the impression is not seen on the card.
Hall, however, said anyone who does not have the impression on their voter's card should take the card to the parliamentary registration headquarters to ensure the impression comes out.
As of Saturday, there were 146,326 people registered to vote.
Ultimately, approximately 172,000 people voted in the last election.
"We still have lots of other stuff to be keyed in," Hall said.
"So we are growing every day and that's a very positive thing to do. We thank God for that.
"I think people are getting the message, better late than never."
Hall added that it is important for the public to note that once Parliament is dissolved, only people who registered the day before would be entitled to vote.

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