A special campaign dubbed “March: Women’s Month, ELECAM Targets Women”, will run till March 31, 2016 nationwide.

As the countdown to the International Women’s Day narrows, different stakeholders are getting set to make the celebration remarkable. Elections management body, ELECAM has also opted to accompany women in the celebration with a special campaign to get women registered on the electoral list. The operation that kicked off yesterday March 1, 2016 will end on March 31^st and targets 30,000 women across the national territory. The operation is dubbed “March: Women’s Month, ELECAM Targets Women”.

According to a communiqué signed by the Director General of ELECAM, Abdoulaye Babale, indicates that a door-to- door campaign will be conducted to boost up the number of female voter card holders and by so doing attain the objectives of getting more women in politics and eventually more women in decision-making positions. To the Head of Division for Communication and Public Relations, Meke née Nguele Florence, women remain a minority on the voters’ list with just 2,764,500 registered representing a 42 per cent of the total number of registered voters which is stands at 5,805;668 as at December 30, 2015.

For the campaign to yield fruits, proximity communication with the grassroots’ population is being employed. Mrs Meke said women’s groups have also been contacted to sensitise their members to register with ELECAM Council branches and staff deployed to the field during this one month period.

The campaign that targets women comes on the heels of a similar one that targeted 20,000 youth in 20 days last month. The campaign, ELECAM officials say, was largely successful as 46,226 youths were registered. These operations, she said, are yielding dividends as 91,750 voters have so far registered as at February 26, for the 2016 voter revision exercise compared to 34, 540 voters registered during the same period last year.