Introduction
It is generally acknowledged that some of our electoral
practices are archaic and that while they served us well in the past, they have
now become the source of serious problems. Moreover, they belong to an era
which preceded the widespread use of information technology. There is also
considerable mistrust in certain quarters about the use of e-voting. And yet
transactions worth millions of rupees take place daily over the internet and
through Automatic Teller Machines (ATMs) across the country. We trust machines
counting our bank notes and updating our bank accounts but insist on our votes
being manually counted as they have always been.
Paradoxically, this over-reliance on human intervention
often results in significant shortcomings as was evident in the recent General
Elections. This article discusses some measures to deal with a few of the more
obvious shortcomings. Unless we want to go back to the practice of
randomly selecting our representatives (prevalent in Ancient Greece), we have
no other option than to set to work on modernising our electoral system
inspired by others who have already travelled this route.
Registration of Voters
One way to simplify the process is to use the list of
National Identity Card (NIC) holders available at Ministry of Social
Integration, Social Security and National Solidarity. Holders are already
expected to provide, among other documents, a proof of address while applying
for the NIC. This address will determine the constituency where the voter will
be allowed to vote and it will be the responsibility of the voter to inform the
Social Security Office of any change of address and submit the relevant
document.
We would thus do away with a wasteful duplication. There
will be no need for compiling a separate list of voters or for annual updating
of the electoral registers or visiting voters’ place of residence for
verification. It follows that local voters will be required to show their
National Identity card in order to be allowed to vote. No other document should
be acceptable. If this process is adopted no NIC holder will ever be denied the
right to vote. A simple process can be put in place for those who lose their
NIC – there should not be too many of these. This would include presenting the
relevant police report featuring a stamped photograph of the bearer. The NIC
list is automatically updated once a person’s death is reported to the Civil
Status office.
Other Commonwealth citizens would be required to register at
the relevant office if they want their names to be included in the voters’ list
and they will have to show a valid passport in order to be allowed to vote.
Counting
The current process is too labour intensive and involves too
many manual interventions that are likely to result in errors of various kinds.
When we trust machines for counting our bank notes, there is no reason why we
should not trust machines for counting our votes.
One approach among many would be to design the ballot papers
differently and use Optical Marker Readers (OMR) similar to those that are used
to score multiple-choice questions in certain examinations. Voters will simply
be required to darken a square or circle next to the name of the person they
wish to vote. Ballot papers will be kept face down in a tray that will simply
be inserted in the OMR at the end of the polling day without having to be
transported elsewhere and/or stored for the night. The savings in
transportation costs, security and salary payable to the army of government
officers involved in the registration of voters and in elections should suffice
to pay for the machines. The use of OMRs would be a transition to the use of
electronic voting machines (or even voting via the internet on smart phones /
tablets as Estonians have been doing since 2005). We should find ways to integrate
adequate controls in e-voting and thus avoid throwing away the baby with the
bath water.
In order to facilitate the process, we should ensure that
only genuine candidates stand for elections. Some constituencies had
more than seventy candidates in the recent General Elections! This
can only delay the counting process. Prospective candidates may be
required to pay an electoral deposit that would be high enough to discourage
frivolous ones. Moreover, the public should not encourage jokers who appear
during every election. Elections should be treated with the seriousness they
deserve. There are more appropriate venues for jokers to display their talent.
Other related measures
While the above proposals will effectively deal with some of
the shortcomings noted during the recent General Elections, they would not
suffice to ensure that the electoral process is fully ‘free and fair’. For
this one would need to implement most of the recommendations contained in the
Sachs Commission Report (http://electoral.govmu.org/English/Reports/Documents/Sachs%20Report.doc)
which deals with issues like election finance and expenses, proportional
representation and the role of the Electoral Supervisory Commission, among
others. We don’t need to re-invent the wheel.
Finally, we should implement measures to regulate the use of
social media during electoral campaigns. The influence of Facebook in recent US
presidential elections and in the Brexit referendum, as well as the role of
organisations like Cambridge Analytica is now public knowledge. The practice of
deliberately publishing fake information using social media has also reached
our shores. This trend is likely to worsen with time. Should we consider
switching off the social media in the final days of electoral campaigns? This
would probably be as unpopular as the prohibition of the sale of alcoholic
drinks in the days preceding the polls was when it was first imposed. If
we want to ensure that elections are fair and that voters are not deliberately
misled, something drastic needs to be done to curtail the potential negative
impact of social media on election results.
Conclusion
The above proposals are far from perfect. The aim of this
article is to trigger a debate which will ultimately yield a series of measures
that would subsequently be introduced through relevant amendments to current
legislation.
Published in Le Mauricien of 16 January, 2020
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