The 27-day registration process, which began at some 300 polling centers on April 23, will end on May 19. He said more than one million Saudi men were eligible to vote for the elections, scheduled to be held in September, Al-Eqtisadiah business daily reported. 

Al-Dahmish said as per the election law, there was no need for renewal of registration for some 800,000 voters who had registered for the first municipal elections six years ago. “These voters will join more than 200,000 voters who turned up for registration in the ongoing registration process that began three weeks ago,” he said while expecting that some more voters would come forward to register themselves within the remaining days. Al-Dahmish said that a number of polling centers had been closed for voter registration after reaching the maximum capacity of 3,000. “Additional polling stations have been opened in these regions to ease the registration process. Citizens who do not register themselves lose their chance to either contest or cast ballots,” he said.

Al-Dahmish attributed the tremendous response of the citizens for voter registration to the growing awareness about the significance of participating in the development process.

“Apparently, citizens have developed a culture of taking part in elections to safeguard the achievements made by the municipal councils. They also started recognizing the key role being played by the councils in chalking out plans and programs for the development of municipal regions, implementing development projects and carrying out studies about the organizational structure of municipalities,” he pointed out.

Al-Dahmish highlighted major achievements made by the municipal councils in their first tenure.