Since, the start of July, when the Elections and Boundaries Department started the re-registration exercise, we've been reporting on the weekly figures.
The idea is to get as many persons as possible back on the voters' roll to keep our democracy robust, and to make sure next year's ICJ referendum has a broad representation of the population.
The Elections and Boundaries Department and the UNDP, have compiled data which closely tracks the trends that occurred since the start of re-registration until the end of August.
So far, just over 122 thousand Belizeans have re-registered, which only 59% of the total number that was on the previous voter's list. The Elections and Boundaries authorities had set a target of 70% of the old list, but as we've shown you, voters just haven't been showing up in that kind of numbers.
Today, the Elections and Boundaries Department hosted an information sharing session, in which they gave a more complete picture of what has happened during this exercise, and 7News was there. The Chief Elections Officer Josephine Tamai presented the data to those gathered, here are a few important excerpts:
Josephine Tamai - Chief Elections Officer
"The rural communities took advantage of the visits. The political parties' mobilization contributed to the success, however, as stakeholders, we must all do our part. At 31st August, 2018, we managed to get a total of 59.25% of the registered electors that we had prior to the commencement of the re-registration exercise. We notice as well that in the second week of July, that is when we had the most applications being received. As we proceed, you notice that the figures go down; it goes back up; it goes back down. And in the last week of August, the figures actually went back up. So, again, as stakeholders, we want to ask you all to please assist us in terms of getting persons registered, encouraging persons to get registered, in order for us to ensure that all Belizeans have a say whenever we have any elections. This graph shows by electoral divisions the divisions that had the highest to the lowest number of applications. So, it's basically in descending order. Stann Creek West electoral division, we got a total of 6,495 applicants, followed by the Orange Walk North, Orange Walk South, and it goes all the way down. The rural area is where we got most of the applications. So, you will notice that from out of the 121,000+ registered voters that we have, 65,472 applications were received in the rural areas, and that represents 53.89% of the number of applications. For the urban area, we received a total of 56,024 applications, and that represents a total of 46.11%. In almost all, in 30 of the 31 electoral divisions, you have more females applying to be registered, when compared to males. You will notice that persons between the age of 25 to 34 years-old, those are the persons who have applied to registered with the highest percentage. We notice that 86.89%, or 105,568 applications have been received for persons who are born Belizeans. This is by country of birth. So, this is telling us that we have 13.11% of the persons have applied who were born outside of the country of Belize. Here we have a breakdown. You'll notice that 7,606 persons, or 6.26% of the persons who have applied to be registered were born in Guatemala. The next highest was El Salvador."
The Chief Elections Officer says that they visited about 140 communities, villages, towns and the 2 cities countrywide. They are urging all eligible voters who have yet to go and get re-registered to still do so. The Department is hopeful that no-eligible voter will be disenfranchised by failing to get re-registered.
Re-registration continues until the end of September, which means that there are only 2 more weeks when the E and B Department will be actively re-registering voters. After that, they resume regular voter registration, but you can still go in and re-register. And, as we said earlier, it's important to do so, because the big voting exercise takes place next year, on April 10th, when citizens will vote yes or no to the ICJ. So, if you want to have a say in whether or not Belize settles Guatemala's claim over our country at the ICJ, make sure to go and get re-registered.
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