Pay, access, and view: Provisional Voter List can be accessed but with a fee

The Provincial Constituencies’ Provisional Voter list can now be accessed at the Electoral Commission Office.

But first, there is also a fee that has to be paid.

Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), Jasper Highwood Anisi said eligible voters living outside their provinces and constituencies especially working people and interested public who want to inspect the Provisional Voter List can access it from the office of the Electoral Commission.

“Anyone who wants to have a copy of the voter list is advised to pay at the Ministry of Finance & Treasury (MoFT) and bring their receipts to the Solomon Islands Electoral Headquarters. You will be given a soft copy of the provisional voter list,” Mr Anisi said.

The CEO also explains why the fees are charged and for what purposes.

“Although the Solomon Islands Electoral Commission would like to distribute the voter list as widely as possible and recognize the need to distribute the list for free, there are administrative costs that the commission has to foot and the fee is purposely to cater for these costs,” he acknowledges.

The cost varies according to the voter population of the constituency and or ward or polling stations including the cost of the flash drive.

CEO Anisi further explained there will be no hardcopy or photocopy list given to any person. A soft copy in PDF format will be handed over to a person with a legitimate receipt in a new flash drive or flash pen.

In the meantime, the Electoral Commission is also working on getting the list accessible online as well.

Mr Anisi also wants to clarify to both new and old eligible registered voters that this is only a draft list and finding your name appears on the voter list does not guarantee that you will be voting on the polling day. The process continues and you have to be certain that no one objected to your name during the Omission and Objection claim phase that will follow.

“Your name might appear in the provisional voter list but if objected during the objection period, your name will be removed from the list which means your name will not be in the final ‘Voter List’,” he emphasised.

He further added that there are three types of lists that were displayed for the public or voters’ scrutiny from the 6th of November 2023 to the 1st of December 2023.

First, the Provisional Voter List includes everyone who has registered in past registration waves from 2014 to 2022 without any changes made to their registration.

Second, is the provisional voter list for pre-registration voters, or 17-year-olds that is also published for public scrutiny

Finally, the list of double registrants to whom the Solomon Islands Electoral Commission had objected for been found registered multiple times in the biometric database.

All these Provisional Voter Lists were already published for public inspection on the 6th of November 2023 in all respective registration centers across the country.

SIEC urges villagers, family members, churches, and community leaders to take the responsibility to also check the voter list and report names of members of the family and community who had died but whose names are still appearing on the provisional list.

The SIEC understands that the Pacific Games 2023 will happen during the inspection and filing of claims period and urges that registered voters especially those living in the provinces who are planning to travel to Honiara to check their names before traveling.

Meanwhile, Mr Anisi on behalf of SIEC continues to acknowledge the Solomon Islands Government, Australian Government, New Zealand Government, and other donors who have helped fund this registration exercise for the support, especially NZEC AEC Electoral Commission for their ongoing support. –ENDS//