Parliament passes proposed electoral law requiring people to use their birth certificate name to be registered as a voter

Parliament has passed the Electoral Registration of Voters Amendment Bill which now requires the application for registration as a voter to state the person’s full name as specified on his or her birth certificate and to also be accompanied by his or her birth certificate.

The bill was tabled on Monday and passed after a debate for one hour in parliament today.

Two other bills have also been debated and passed in parliament today after debate for one hour each.

The Interpretation Amendment Bill amends the Act to require those who are authorised or required by any written law to provide their name, to only provide their name as it appears on their birth certificate. This requirement extends to any form of identification provided by a person where such form of identification must state the name as it appears on the person’s birth certificate.

It also requires any agency or approving authority of any kind which receives applications or submissions to only accept the name of an applicant if the name is as it appears on the applicant’s birth certificate.

There is a transitional period where these provisions will ensure that certificates, licences, permits, deeds and other documents which refer to names of people that are different from the names on their birth certificates, continue in existence if they do not have an expiration date.

On the other hand, if such documents have an expiration date, then any renewal or new documents issued would have to refer to their names as specified on their birth certificates.

The Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Amendment Bill removes the requirement for a deed poll and requires a person who wishes to change his or her name to do so by applying to have the change of name registered. This has to be done at the Births, Deaths and Marriages Office.

The proposed amendment also reduces the age from 21 to 18 years for those that want to change their name.

It also seeks to amend the Act to permit the mother of a child born alive or stillborn in Fiji to register her child and to give her equal status as that of the father of the child. At the moment, only the father of a child may register the child at first and the mother of the child may only register her child if the father of the child is deceased, ill, absent or is unable to register the child.

While tabling the electoral bill for debate in parliament, Attorney General, Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum says the ruling of the Court of Disputed Returns last month in Niko Nawaikula’s case has a significant impact on the National Register of Voters, and the changes to the Electoral Registration of Voters Amendment Bill is necessary to ensure people register with the names on their birth certificate.

Sayed-Khaiyum says the Court of Disputed Returns stated that the law does not specifically require use of birth certificate names and for the purpose of registration as a voter allows the use of names other than the birth certificate name. He says the court nor the legal counsel considered the practical implications of such a strict literal reading of the law, and it was not brought to the court’s attention and therefore they did not expect to make a ruling on that.

Sayed-Khaiyum says the Fijian Elections Office will amongst other things find it difficult to identify and remove deceased persons from the National Register of Voters should people be allowed to register with names other than those on their birth certificate and this will allow people to register with more than one name.

The Attorney General says the Fijian Elections Office will also find difficulty in verifying a person’s citizenship and date of birth at the time of registration.

He says there will be a risk of manipulation as section 53 (1) of the Constitution states that a person has one vote with each vote being of equal value in a single National Electoral Roll.