{UAH} Nearly 80% of Kinshasa vote material destroyed in fire

https://www.independent.co.ug/nearly-80-of-kinshasa-vote-material-destroyed-in-fire/

Nearly 80 percent of the materials for staging the December 23 election in DR Congo's capital, Kinshasa, were destroyed when an election warehouse was torched overnight, officials said Thursday.

The blaze ripped through a large warehouse in central Kinshasa in the early hours of Thursday morning, destroying most of the election materials stored inside, including a large number of controversial touch-screen voting terminals.

"The fire consumed materials destined for 19 of Kinshasa's 24 districts," said Corneille Nangaa, head of CENI, the Independent National Election Commission.

The city, which is also one of DR Congo's 25 provinces, represents around 11 percent of the country's 4.4 million registered voters.

Nangaa said the fire had destroyed "nearly 8,000 of the 10,368 voting terminals earmarked for Kinshasa" — around three-quarters of them.