Voting fails to take off in three polling stations in Kaputa

Voting fails to take off in three polling stations in Kaputa

Kaputa January 20,2015—Voting has failed to take off at three polling stations in Kaputa constituency in Kaputa district after the Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) district failed to dispatch man power and election material to the area.

Kaputa District Electoral Officer, Patson Kapoba who confirmed the development in an interview with ZANIS said ECZ failed to send staff and election materials as the area is not passable by road.

Mr. Kapoba who is Kaputa District Council Secretary named the areas where voting has not started as Chonganya in Kalungwishi ward, Kapasha in Chiyilunda ward and Mataka in Kaleulu ward.

He said he had informed the Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) on the development who had promised to send a chopper to ferry electoral staff and materials to the affected areas.

Voting had still not started by 09:00 hours but Mr. Kapoba has still remained hopeful that the ECZ will send a chopper so that people in the area are given chance to vote in the on-going election.

Mr. Kapoba has meanwhile disclosed that voting in all the other polling stations in the district has started and is going on smoothly.

He said voting in the other polling stations started at 06:00 hours and some slightly afterwards and is progressing well.

And a check by ZANIS at some polling stations in Choma ward in Kaputa boma found voting going on well though although it was characterised by a low turnout.

At Kaputa Primary School about 250 people out of the 2,380 registered voters had cast their votes by 09:00 hours and only a handful of people were seen going to the voting centre.

The situation was the same at Kaputa Skills Training where 140 people had cast their votes by 09:00 hours out of the 1,740 registered voters.

Meanwhile, police had to chase away some political party cadres who were reported to have been telling people who were coming for voting to vote for their preferred candidates.

Police officers told the cadres who were standing within 400 metres of the polling station to move away and stop influencing people to vote for their candidate warning that they risk being arrested as the campaign period was over.