By Martha Taumata Faavae
The 2021 General Elections may still be a few months away but the pace of preparations has picked up noticeably in the past few weeks.
The Office of the Electoral Commissioner has been working virtually non-stop to keep up with the streaming flow of voters registration over the ensuing period.
Work has moved on to a different area but it is still on going.
The earlier workload in recent weeks for the OEC staff concentrated mostly in Apia where they were under a tight schedule to have everyone registered before the deadline.
Huge crowds were caught up in a mad last minute race to sign up before the voters roll closed.
Long, weary hours continued into the night for the OEC staff to clear up the unregistered masses.
After barely catching their breath they were off again last week with a change in venue for registrations.
The attention shifted to Savaii to the Don Bosco Hall, Salelologa, and this time it was to register official candidates nominated by their respective Electoral Constituencies for the General Elections.
The undertaking made election history when candidates signed up for the first time ever on the big island without having to make the costly travel to Office of the Electoral Commissioner in Apia. (see other story).
Electoral Commissioner Faimalomatumua Mathew Lemisio led his staff, as he has been doing all along, for the history making exercise.
The long hours he and his staff has been keeping recently was all part of the job as far as the Commissioner Faimalomatumua is concerned.
“We have a sworn duty to see that the country’s General Elections are properly carried out and we have to make sure of it,” Electoral Commissioner, Faimalomatumua Mathew Lemisio resolved.
“The physical stress is there but we have laid out our work programme to follow all the way to the holding of General Elections next year.
“While everyone was busy with White Sunday our full focus was on our work but we did managed to sneak in a session of physical exercise to keep healthy.”
The pace was less strenuous for the registration at Salelologa of candidates and the OEC working team were back in Apia last Friday to continue the work in Upolu.
“We’re done with the voters roll so that has been set aside as we move towards the registration of candidates nominations.”
A total of 47 candidates were registered during the week from Savaii. The number went up to a total of 71 after the registration of Upolu candidates on Friday.
The HRPP has the most number of candidates so far with 35, FAST 28, Tautua Samoa 5 with 3 independents.
There are 8 women candidates included in the count so far, 7 from Savaii.