2.6 million voters to miss polls
By Badru D. Mulumba
Monitor, April 15, 2005
KAMPALA — A report of registered voters confirms Kampala as the district to scramble for by the political parties in the run up to a possible referendum, and possibly the presidential elections.
But Mbarara is fast bridging the gap, according to the report that also shows that about 2.6 million eligible voters could miss voting on account of failure to register.
Every 6 out of 100 registered voters reside in Kampala (525,553) compared to 5 out of every 100 voters in Mbabara (440,790) Wakiso, Mbale and Bushenyi follow in that order.
The gap between Kampala and Mbarara is down to 84,793 registered voters from a gap of 104,048 voters in 2001.
Third placed Wakiso (314, 920) - the same position as in 2001 - also has the highest number of actual eligible voters who have not registered, according to a ranking of the districts by number of re
gistered
voters done by The Monitor from the Electoral Commission statistics.
The updated list of total registered voters was released to the Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Committee on April 12. In the report, Electoral Commission chairman Badru Kiggundu said the voters were captured in 2001 and during the continuous voter registration (August 2003 to February 2005). Voters captured from March 7 to March 24 were yet to be included in the report.
The new voters list is relevant in the face of the current politicking and likely elections where politicians will want to be strategic.
The Monitor’s calculations indicate that almost half the registered voters (4,021,358) are found in only 14 districts.
And of the 8.5 million registered voters, 3,126,561 are in ten districts.
According to the Electoral Commission registration returns, Bushenyi (282,900) rose to fourth displacing Mbale (282,283) who dropped to fifth and Mukono (269,850), which fell to sixth.
However, Mukono has a high number of eligible voters than Mbale and Bushenyi meaning that its fall to sixth position is only because 74 out of every 100 voters turned out to register in Mukono compared to 86 out of every 100 in Bushenyi.
The ranking further shows Masaka (269,422) stuck at seventh ahead of Iganga (252,900) at eighth and Lira (246,324) at ninth.
But Mubende (241,148) slipped to eleventh being overtaken by Arua (241,863) that rose to
tenth.
“The initial response from the general public to the continuing registration was not encouraging but the Commission, nevertheless, continued with programmes that included schools, institutions, Government Ministries and Statutory bodies, among others, both at headquarters and in districts,” says the EC Report.
A quarter of all eligible voters (23.99 percent) did not register to vote, which puts 2,690,528 potential votes to waste during the upcoming referendum or during the national elections - in case they don’t register later in the year.
Curiously, while some districts achieved a near one hundred percent registration, in others only just over half the eligible voting population turned up to register.
“Karamoja region has a problem where population of voting age is out grazing animals and is unreachable for registration purposes,” says the Electoral Commission.
In Kotido, only 30 out of every 100 voters registered (82,998) - leaving 187
,168
eligible voters in the wilderness. And in Nakapiripirit, only 57 out of every 100 eligible voters have registered.
In Moyo, only 41 out of every 100 eligible voters registered (37,583) - leaving 53,017 eligible voters off the voters’ roll. And in Adjumani, registration was only 43 out of every 100 eligible voters (39,115). And in Yumbe, 52 out of every 100 eligible voters missed the exercise.
However, the EC blames the wide mismatch between eligible voters to registered voters to faulty census results.
“Border districts like Adjuman and Moyo have refugee populations that were included in the census figures,” says the report.
In his report to Parliament, Kiggundu said: “While it is the responsibility of the Electoral Commission to put in place facilities for registration of voters, it is the duty of every Ugandan aged 18 years and above to register as a voter for public elections and referenda.”
The EC cites Article 59 of the Constitution.
“It is
important to note that it is not mandatory for one to register as a voter or even to participate in the electoral process,” he says.
However, several other districts outside these regions registered miserable turnouts. Soroti had 56 per 100 eligible voters registering to vote.
In Apac, 70 per 100 eligible voters registered, and in Lira it was 71 per 100 eligible voters.
In Bundibugyo, it is only 68 per 100 eligible voters, and in Hoima only 63 per 100 voters. In Kabarole 72 out of 100 eligible voters.
Interestingly, the war-ravaged districts of Gulu, Pader and Kitgum had a fair registration turnout than many other districts. In Gulu 82 per 100 eligible voters turned out to register while this was 72 per 100 in Pader and Kitgum.
But in actual numbers, Wakiso district had the highest number of eligible voters who could miss the vote. According to the report, 118,919 eligible voters in Wakiso did not register.
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