Leaders represented in the High Level Political Committee (HLPC) on Tuesday formally urged the EC top officials to provide one more week for voter registration for the Constituent Assembly (CA) election scheduled for November 19. “We told them [leaders represented in HLPC] that technically it is not possible to provide another chance for voter registration,” Chief Election Commissioner Neel Kantha Uprety told Republica.
The chief election commissioner said there would be managerial difficulties for the constitutional body if it extended the deadline for voter registration time and again.
According to Uprety, the leaders requested additional time for voter registration arguing that one-week window period given by constitutional body is not sufficient.
The constitutional body has already announced its calendar of events and the program for the proportional representation and first-past-the-post (FPTP) electoral systems. [break]
“There is no room for adjustment in the calendar of events now,” said Election Commissioner Ila Sharma, who also oversees the calendar of events.
Only 90 days are left for the new CA election from Tuesday.
Emerging from the meeting, CPN-UML leader Raghuji Panta told media persons that they made the request in accordance with consensus forged among the political parties on the issue. Earlier in the day, an HLPC meeting had decided to request EC to give one more week for voter registration.
Acting on the request of major political parties, the EC on Thursday had decided to give one-week window period for voter registration starting Saturday. The commission has been registering voters in all the district headquarters across the country.
EC has said Nepali citizens who have completed 18 years by mid-July this year can register on the new electoral rolls within the given timeline.
HLPC on August 2 had requested the constitutional body to provide another chance for voters to register on the new electoral rolls.
Also, EC has already set mid-July of this year as the cutoff date for eligible voting age for the purpose of upcoming CA election.
EC has registered 12.3 million voters on the new electoral rolls over the last three years. It had concluded voter registration on July 15.
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