The information was made known by the president of the electoral board
of Elecam Samuel Fonkam Azu. The decision to move over to biometric
registration comes at a time when efforts are being made to better the
electoral system of the country.
Before the 2011 presidential election, Cameroonians in and out of the country had called on the authorities to make the electoral system one that was void of fraud. With the creation of Elecam to oversee the election process in the country after Onel, a couple of loopholes were outlined after the October 9 polls. Going back to the drawing board to clear the system was what opinion leaders of the various political parties saw as a remedy to a lame electoral system.With the municipal and parliamentary elections scheduled to hold this year, the elections organizing body saw the need to clean up voter’s lists to avoid the issue of people having more than one voter’s cards as witnessed last year. The decision to do a recompilation of voter’s lists was to them a way of righting the wrongs of the past. Work had started on the revision of lists until February 7 when the news about a recompilation of voter’s lists was announced. At an extraordinary board meeting of its members, Elecam announced that the registration process would start from scratch. Opinions were rife as concerns the respect of the electoral calendar if the recompilation as announced was to be done. Making plans for a service provider to be contracted in the nearest future is matching words with actions and clearing doubts that have been looming the air. In the first ordinary session of the board for 2012, an explanation of what the biometric system was all about was done, for as Dr Fonkam Azu’u said, “people don’t understand what it is all about”. He explained that the recompilation of voter’s lists will be carried out by mobile teams that will go closer to the voters. As concerns the registration, the president of Elecam said they knew exactly what to be done to ensure an effective exercise even in the absence of a calendar. In his words “we would go as much as possible towards the citizens. There will be at least one machine permanently at the council office, but there will be mobile teams that will go towards potential voters to villages and quarters”. He said “if we remain at the level of the council branch the exercise will not be effective”.The elections organizing body has for some time now been holding discussions with actors of the civil society as well as political party leaders to see how they can work together to improve the system. Talking about the recent meetings with stakeholders in the electoral process Fonkam Azu’u said Elecam would implement all the recommendations within its powers. He none the less said there were some recommendations that were not within their reach like Ayah Paul Abine’s request for a single ballot and the second round of vote demanded by some. Complains were recorded on the ink used during last year’s poll as not being indelible. Addressing the issue, the Elecam boss gave assurances saying that “everything would be done to ensure that we do not have two types of ink, one administrative and the other indelible which may lead to confusion on the part of our collaborators”. Field trips have been scheduled for members of the electoral board in the months ahead and a national meeting to be held in Yaounde too.
Claudette chin
