By Julian Koroma

Claim: Concord Times Tweeted ECSL staff allowing people to vote without accreditation.

Verdict: Misleading– ECSL staff allowed only people whose names were on the ECSL voter register to vote even without showing accreditation.

Full Text

A tweet from Concord Times’ Twitter page claims that on the 24^th of July during voting hours the ECSL officials at New England Ville (PC16194) were allowing people to vote without accreditation.

During the many voter education campaigns of ECSL, the literature had been that individuals without tangible voter ID cards would be allowed to vote if the said person’s name given can be located in the ECSL voters register.

Additionally, the person has to answer two security questions which are “What are your mother and Father’s full names” if such security questions are answered correctly and the face of said individual matches the one on the ECSL voters register then that person would be allowed to vote without any tangible voter ID.

Methodology

A call to ECSL’s Director of Media and Communication, George Jones confirms that the above procedure was followed by ECSL officials at New England (the area where the claim was identified) and many other centres operated as such.

Conclusion

The SLAJ/NDI SuperNewsRoom found the tweet of Concord Times to be misleading.

NOTE: This fact-checked story is a product of the SLAJ/NDI SuperNewsRoom on Combating Disinformation in Sierra Leone’s 2023 electoral cycle. The project is supported by Global Affairs Canada to enable citizens to have access to credible and accurate information during the elections.

The SuperNewsRoom is powered by Africell SL.

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