Encourage more voter turnout

Letters

THE Bougainville Referendum will be conducted on Nov 23, which is about two weeks away.
About 220,000 Bougainvilleans were registered to vote in the referendum
The Bougainville Referendum Commission (BRC) has promised to deliver a free and fair referendum.
With Bougainville having a history of poor voter turnouts in previous national and Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG) elections, the fear of poor voter turnout for this referendum remains.
For the upcoming referendum, even if half of the Bougainville-registered voters do not vote, there is fear that the referendum will not satisfy the “free and fair” test as required.
Secondly, even if 90 per cent vote for independence, with only a 50 per cent voter turnout, the referendum vote could still be categorised as not being “representative of the majority of people”.
Such a referendum result can still be challenged. The question is: “What is Bougainville Referendum Commission doing to encourage a higher voter turnout with only two weeks remaining? What awareness has been made so far?”
Can the BRC or (regional member) Joe Lera or any Bougainville member of parliament put some money immediately for the media such as EMTV, TV Wan, NBC and others (during short commercial breaks) to inform all Bougainvillean-registered voters to cast their ballots?
This paid advertisement should continue until the end of polling day. This is necessary to get as many voters to vote for this very historic referendum in the history of Papua New Guinea.

Pau Piahe, Arawa,
South Bougainville