KUWAIT: Every Kuwaiti citizen who is over 21 years of age is eligible to vote in the 2022 National Assembly elections, an interior ministry official said on Monday. Head of the elections affairs committee Col Ahmad Al-Hajri told KUNA that eligible voters using their civil ID cards can cast their ballots in the constituencies corresponding to the address specified in the document.

All eligible voters can verify their voting registration at their local police stations corresponding to their residential address on the civil ID cards, Hajri affirmed. The official said voters have the right to contest the inclusion of their names in the voting list in certain constituencies and they can also change their constituencies by submitting a request to the election affairs department. Those excluded from the voters' list can also contest the procedure legally, Hajri added.

The official indicated that on Election Day, voters need to bring their citizenship and civil ID cards to complete their voting process. Those who have lost their citizenship cards should head to the department of citizenship and travel documents to obtain a 'to whom it may concern' paper to enable them to vote on Election Day, Hajri explained. The Cabinet recently approved voting using civil ID cards, and also added new areas in four constituencies.

The requirement to use only civil IDs for voters to prove their place of residence is a major change in Kuwaiti elections, which in the past depended on electoral rolls prepared by the interior ministry and updated every year in February. The use of electoral rolls had allegedly allowed candidates to illegally move voters from one district to another to dramatically boost their chances of winning a seat in the National Assembly. Such allegations were widely made in the local media and on social media, where the names of the alleged culprits were published without evidence. - Agencies