Papua New Guinea’s General Election 2022 bombshell: EC says Common Roll unreliable, check online

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Papua New Guinea’s General Election 2022 bombshell: EC says Common Roll unreliable, check online

PORT MORESBY: Papua New Guinea (PNG) Electoral Commissioner Simon Sinai has directed election managers (EMs) and election returning officers (ROs) not to just rely on the Common Roll to allow Papua New Guineans to cast their votes for General Election 2022(GE22).

“Use the online voter roll to check names if the names are not on the roll.

“The voter roll is an online page on the Electoral Commission (EC)’s website.

“It allows both first-time and voters and those who had not voted in the past to check if their names are on the GE22 roll,” he added.

And Prime Minister James Marape has admitted that the roll “was not adequately prepared” for GE22 and apologized to those unable to cast their votes because their names were “missing”.

“The roll was not adequately prepared. Our preparations and logistics were slow,” he added.

PNG Cyber Monitor reproduces below the news break and a few GE22 news updates as published by The National:

PM: Sorry for missing names

July 8, 2022The NationalMain Stories

By STAFF REPORTERS
PRIME Minister James Marape has admitted that the common roll “was not adequately prepared” for the General Election 2022 (GE22), and apologised to those unable to cast their votes because their names were “missing”.
“The common roll was not adequately prepared. Our preparations and logistics were slow,” he said.
He suggested that everyone whose names were missing in the common roll, but had voted in 2017, or before, should be allowed to vote in GE22.
“We’ve advised the Electoral Commission that people, as long as they are adults and voted in 2017 or earlier, should be allowed their Section 50 right to vote (in GE22) for the candidate of their choice,” he said.
“No one should be turned away at the polls.”
Yesterday, Electoral Commissioner Simon Sinai directed election officials to use the online voter roll to check names if they were not on the common roll.
The voter roll is an online page on the Electoral Commission’s (EC) website.
It allows both first-time voters and those who had voted in the past to check if their names are on the GE22 roll.
“I am being advised by my technical staff that the electoral roll look-up is progressing,” he said.
“People yet to vote in provinces and villages can confirm where you will be able to cast your vote.”
Sinai said that Government funding on the updating of the common rolls was released only in November.
“I have admitted time after time that we were doing our utmost best to have (people) enrolled, but we ran out of time,” he said.
“(Funding) was only released to us in November 2021, so we had to push for the elections because it was a constitutional requirement.”
Election manager Kila Ralai said a Form 57 used in the past for those whose names were missing on the common roll was banned in GE22.
“Commissioner (Sinai) has not given the approval for us to use them in GE22,” he said.
Sinai yesterday thanked Indian High Commissioner Inbasekar Sundaramuthir and his government for providing indelible ink to be used during the GE22.

Counting must go ahead: Official

July 8, 2022The NationalMain Stories

By REBECCA KUKU
PROVINCIAL election manager in Hela, John Tipa, has stressed that the counting of votes is an important part of the election process which must be seen through to the end.
He was responding to a petition by 15 candidates addressed to the Electoral Commission (EC), demanding that a senior EC officer and a lawyer from Port Moresby be flown over to oversee the counting process in Hela.
The candidates, led by former Hela governor Francis Potape, also petitioned the provincial election office to set aside all disputed boxes and to check and balance the returns.
But Tipa told them that the counting of votes would proceed.
“Even I do not have the powers to stop counting,” he said.
He advised the candidates that if they had any grievances, they should take them up to the court.
“Counting will proceed today (yesterday),” he said.
Tipa said for ballot boxes to be declared as disputed, the recommendation must come from the presiding EC officers, security teams, scrutineers and the people.
“If there is enough evidence, (we will make a decision).
“Otherwise, we will proceed with the counting,” Tipa said.
On the returns, he said “we will do checks and balance with you and your supporters”.
Tipa said he would pass on the petition to Electoral Commissioner Simon Sinai.
“But we will not wait.
“We will go ahead with the counting,” he said.

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Counting for SHP in one location, says official

COUNTING of votes in Southern Highland will be held at Momei Oval in Mendi only for security reasons, says Election Manager Alvin Jimmy.
The original plan was to also conduct counting at the Imbonggu district office at Walume for the Kagua-Erave, Ialibu-Pangia and Imbonggu districts, and at Momei Oval in Mendi for Nipa-Kutubu, Mendi-Munihu and the regional seats.
“But Electoral Commissioner Simon Sinai, after considering security and logistic issues, decided to have only one counting venue – Momei Oval,” he said.
Work is underway at the Momei Oval to build a venue for the counting.
Materials have already arrived for the polling on Monday in the province.
He said the materials would be distributed to the returning officers to take to their districts.
“The returning and assistant returning officers already had their training and the returning officers have been tasked to train the presiding and assistant presiding officers,” he said.
“For the counting, they were trained also as there has been some changes such as counting LLG (local level government) by LLG.
“This will be faster.
“After seven to eight days, we will make declarations.”
Jimmy said members of the security forces were travelling from one province to another to monitor the polling.

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Soldiers in Tari to boost counting security

Part of the crowd in Tari yesterday listening to updates from provincial election officers. Soldiers have been sent to Tari to bolster security before counting begins today. – Picture supplied

EXTRA soldiers have been sent to Tari to bolster security before the counting of votes begins today.
Defence Force Liaison Officer Major Joshua Dorpar said additional manpower was brought in from Enga to support the police in Hela.
He said the security forces were taking any threats to security seriously.
“One platoon and a taskforce team from Enga have come down to bolster manpower,” he said.
Major Dorpar is acting commander of the joint security forces.