Mombasa politicians have decried low turnouts in the ongoing mass voter registration exercise being conducted country-wide by the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC).

IEBC is targeting to register about 5 million new voters country-wide with the coastal region given a target of slightly above 800,000 new voters.

In Mombasa, IEBC was targeting to register 190,237 new voters, but since the exercise kicked off on October 4, they have managed only 4,486 representing only 2 percent of the target.

According to a report released by IEBC on Sunday, Mombasa has been listed among the counties that have recorded lowest percentage of targets in the last 7 days. Others are Nairobi, Kirinyaga, Embu, Laikipia, Muranga, Kitui, Nyandarua, Nyeri and Kiambu. The exercise is expected to be over after 30 days.

Mvita legislature Abdulswamad Nassir, his Jomvu counterpart Badi Twalib and Mombasa senator Mohammed Faki on Monday rallied Mombasa residents who are yet to be registered to turn out in large numbers.

Nassir and Faki were speaking during the launch of a mass voter registration campaign at the NG-CDF offices in Mvita Constituency.

“I am sure that I will be the next Mombasa governor through the ODM party, but we cannot do that with low numbers, I appeal to you to go and knock on the doors of everyone who is yet to register as a voter and urge them to do so,” said Nassir.

“Remember that bad leader are chosen by those who do not vote,” added Nassir

Nassir also used the platform to launch an onslaught on his political nemesis  Suleiman Shahbal whom he accused of being greedy and using money to buy Mombasa people.

The legislature stated that his tactic will not work calling on Mombasa people to eat the money but vote wisely when the time comes adding that “some people will soon defect from ODM.”

“Some people think that they can buy Mombasa people with their money, continue with your wishful thinking but note that you will not buy off people who are determined to ensure that I seat on the governor’s office come 2022,” said Nassir.

Nassir alluded that he had the people at heart stating that those surrounding him (Shahbal) were only after his money.

“”We will not sell our souls because of your greed, we are here because of our agenda and what we have done for the people,” said Nassir.

Senator Faki called on the youth who recently acquired their national Identity Cards to use the opportunity to go and register as voters if they want to cast their ballot for the first time in 2022.

He added that the youth had numbers and must be involved in the running of the county and country at large.

“The youth must be given space to lead, I want to urge the incoming Mombasa governor (Nassir) to ensure that you allocate more slots for the youth in your government especially the department of youth gender and sports must be led by the youth themselves,” said Faki.

Faki added that Nassir was best suited to take over from governor Joho given that he has been at the forefront of fighting for Mombasa people.

“We support Nassir because we have fought with him for our people while others were sleeping, he took the lead during the anti-SGR demonstrations that wanted to take port operations away from Mombasa, he has also been steadfast on the issue of forced disappearances of our people orchestrated by people said to be police, Mombasa will be safe with him,” added Faki.

Speaking at Amani Primary school during issuance of bursary cheques to his constituents, Jomvu MP Badi Twalib urged those living in the area to register as voters in the constituency to continue enjoying resources and development allocated to Jomvu.

“I believe it will be proper for one to be a bona fide voter in Jomvu to continue enjoying resources allocated to Jomvu people, lets come out and register as voters,” said Twalib.

Twalib also lashed out at United Democratic Alliance members in Mombasa accusing them of tricking people with development promises requiring their particulars to be registerd only to use the details to register them as UDA members.

“By law you cannot be a member of two political parties at same time, many of our ODM members have fallen prey to their tricks, we will soon embark on an exercise to register ODM members to ensure that our register is clean,” said Twalib.