The APRC Campaign Committee for the upcoming Local Government elections, led by SoS Yankuba Touray, who doubles as the party's National Mobilser on Monday began a nation-wide tour to sensitise party members  on the procedures for  the selection of candidates.

Speaking at meetings held in Kerewan, Farafenni, Janjangbureh and Basse, SoS Touray spoke on the importance of the elections, the selection process of candidates, the criteria and application process.

He  said the Local Government elections is as equally important as that of  Presidential and  National Assembly elections and APRC supporters  should come out in full force to vote. He said that the 1997 Second Republican Constitution gave the electorate the chance to elect their Area Council Chairman and Councillors. But amendments to the constitution, he went on,   electorate will now  vote for only Councillors who will inturn select a Chairman and deputy Chairman for Local Councils, except BCC and KMC where the mayors will be voted for. 

Selection process
According to the APRC National  Mobiliser, APRC Constituency Committees will supervise the selection process of  all aspiring candidates. He pointed out that applications forms can be obtained from the Constituency Chairman, who will be part of the committee at all district levels.

"No chairman has the right to stop any aspiring candidate from obtaining a form as a result of individual differences".  Soon after all the aspiring candidates have submitted their forms to the district or constituency committee, the forms will be forwarded to the Divisional Committee.

At this level, SoS Touray added that Divisional Committee will approve three candidates and forward their names to the party leader, President Yahya Jammeh to select a candidate for the constituency.

Criteria
The savvy APRC National Mobiliser advised aspiring candidates to meet the following requirements: A secondary education (not grade nine) certificate, must be resident in the ward that he is contesting for, at least one year; must be a tax payer; must have a register voters card in that ward; must have an APRC membership card or have at least 3 people to testify to his/her membership as an APRC militant.

He said those in the security forces, NAMs, Chiefs and Alkalous, who aspire to contest, must resign from their positions first before they apply.

Application forms
SoS Touray finally announced that application forms can be obtained from the Constituency Chairman at the rate of D250 non- refundable.  In addition, all the conditions in the application form must be met by any of the aspiring contestants.

For his part, Ousman Sonko, the Secretary of State for Interior spoke on the replacement and transfer of voters card, as well as security aspects during the campaign. SoS Sonko said the IEC will from today 1st -30th  November conduct a replacement and voters card transfer exercise at all the IEC regional offices at a cost of D50 only.  He said it is important to have a voters card since there will be no vote without a voters card.

Security
SoS Sonko on the security matters urged all and sundry to jealously guard the ever- existing peace in the country.

He said peace is the cornerstone of development initiative.  He lamented that without peace nothing will work.
Bala Garba Jahumpa, alias, Action Man  joined the tour immediately after returning from Cuba as a special envoy of President Jammeh.