Officers who’ll miss Sunday’s special voting cannot vote on Dec. 7 - EC

Any security officer who misses Sunday’s window of opportunity to exercise his franchise in the second round of special voting will not be allowed to vote on December 7, the Electoral Commission has explained.

At an emergency Inter-Party Advisory Committee [IPAC] meeting Thursday, the EC said Sunday’s round of voting will be the last for the officers who could not vote in Thursday’s Special Voting exercise.

A total of 127,000 voters made up of medial and security personnel as well as electoral officials who will be engaged on December 7 for various duties were expected to cast their ballot in the special voting.

But hundreds of them, mainly security officers, could not cast their ballot because their names were excluded from the list of special voters, something that triggered anxiety among the officers who feared they could be disenfranchised in this year’s general elections.

Following complaints of widespread exclusion of names of hundreds of security officers from the special voters’ list, the EC agreed Thursday night at the emergency IPAC meeting to go for a second round of voting on Sunday to afford the affected officers the last opportunity.

“The Commission explained to the parties that anyone who misses the opportunity on Sunday will not be able to vote on December 7,” TV3’s Jonathan Adams reported from the meeting.

"You can only vote in your constituency Again, all the affected officers are required to go to their respective original constituencies where they registered, to be able to cast their vote on Sunday and not where they are to perform their electoral duties.

“The EC said the fact that one had his name on the special list does not mean they can vote at where they indicated to vote. In the case where they have not done voter transfer, they will have to go to their original constituency where they registered to vote,” our correspondent reported.

It also emerged at the emergency meeting that some quasi security agencies did not apply to partake in Thursday’s special voting exercise, while some of them assumed they could vote from where they indicated on their forms.

The parties are meanwhile, urging the security services which did not apply to be part of the special voting exercise to make arrangements for their personnel to be deployed to their respective constituencies so they could vote early on election day and perform their duties there.