The Independent Electoral Commission IEC has said there is no discrepancy in its supplementary voter registration information provided to the public.
The Commission made the clarification in response to concerns raised by the opposition UDP which demanded the release of all information from the 2026 supplementary voter registration exercise, alleging a discrepancy of 28,932 voters between the Commissions’s announced figures and dataset provided to the party.
According to the UDP, the IEC announced a total of 212,095 registered voters while the dataset provided to the party contained only 183,163 representing a difference of 13.6 percent of the announced total. The UDP demanded that the IEC give a clear explanation to avoid doubts over its credibility.
Addressing these concerns in an interview with The Standard yesterday, IEC Vice Chairman Cherno Jallow categorically stated that there is no discrepancy adding that this issue has been raised repeatedly during discussions with the UDP and also during the stakeholders forum where they explained to the parties that the figure of 212,095 that was given to them was the raw data from the field.
“It includes replacements, reprints, and spoiled or damaged cards. But when we did the cross-matching, verification and adjudication, we were able to detect all these things including cases of double registration and they were removed,” Jallow said.
“So the figure of 14,334 persons involved in double registration is different from 24,058 that we initially announced because some people registered twice or three times and that is what gave that number to reach beyond 24,000. The system records everything and it was in a very transparent manner that we shared this openly with parties. We have made it clear to them that this is the raw data from the field. It was unedited and unverified and we provided them as they were received from the various registration centres across the country making the figure of 212,095 but after the cross-matching and verification, the figure went down,” Jallow said, but did not provide how much remains following this exercise.
He said the Commission will not engage in a back and forth argument with the UDP but assured them that IEC is “committed to preserving the integrity and credibility of the voter register.
Failure to respond to formal requests
The UDP also accused the Commission of failing to respond to its repeated formal requests for information about the supplementary voter registration exercise, documents including registration statistics before and after removal of duplicate records, details of deleted registrations and the methodology used to identify and verify duplicate entries.
In response, Vice Chairman Jallow acknowledged that the UDP had written to them twice making requests adding that the Commission should have responded but they have been “very busy.”
“But we still have plans to respond and we will respond because we have an obligation to do so. The UDP is an important stakeholder and we have never refused to respond to them. But we have responded to all these queries during a stakeholders meeting in August. We are very open and transparent with the figures we are providing. So once the revising courts complete their process, the magistrates will sign off to that register and it will be added to the Master Register of 2021 and that will give us the final register which we will share with political parties as required by the law”, he said.
He argued that the Commission did not fail to respond because of lack of respect for the party. “We have just been very busy, with all of us out in the field, conducting trainings for the staff, in addition to the revising courts and also currently the recruitment of polling agents. But we will get back to them,” he assured.
Jallow said the IEC has nothing to hide and will work with all stakeholders to provide a credible, transparent, fair, inclusive and peaceful electoral process that will reflect the will of the Gambian people.