Ogot: Use of technology in African elections not foolproof

The recent order by Malawi’s Electoral Commission (MEC) for a manual recount of electoral results following massive voting irregularities was an inadvertent admission that the experiment with electronic voting technology did not turn out well for the country’s recent elections.

Like had earlier occurred in Ghana in 2012, where voting was extended by a day, voting in Malawi was also extended by two days due to electronic anomalies. Voting extensions are costly and, on average, could require up to an extra Sh87 million per day.

Of particular concern was that Malawi’s dilemma followed that of Kenya in 2013, and Ghana, Cameroon and Sierra Leone in 2012, which were also dogged by disputes arising from malfunctioning electronic technologies.

In Kenya, Ghana, and Sierra Leone, poor timing for the introduction of electronic technology, opaque tendering processes and systems manipulation were cited as probable causes of the malfunctions. All these cases, just like it happened in Malawi, resulted in costly court petitions.

Ironically, though new technologies are projected to optimise credibility, efficiency and reduce disputes as well as costs, the reality has been somewhat different.

Malawi had spent about $43 million (Sh3.7 billion) while Ghana and Kenya had spent a substantial Sh7 billion and Sh8.7 billion respectively to purchase the electronic equipment.

At the close of elections in each case, the election management bodies (EMBs) were not only burdened by debt, but each had also suffered irreparable damage to their institutional credibility.

For this reason, Tanzania has decided to use the system only for voter registration and not during actual voting, National Electoral Commission (NEC) Vice Chairman Hamid Mahmoud Hamid said. Tanzania had budgeted about $50 million (Sh4.3 billion) to purchase equipment for next year’s elections.

Following growing concerns about the efficiency of electronic equipment in elections, it will be interesting to see how Uganda’s Electoral Commission incorporates electronic equipment in her 2016 General Election without any slip-ups.

Bio-metric Voter Registration (BVR) systems capture one or more physical, biological, behavioural characteristics, which are then usually stored in a data base and used for identification and verification.

They are routinely used the world over for passport and national identification exercises and already exist in nations that purportedly purchase them for elections at exorbitant costs.

Functionally, BVR systems offer no new feature customised for elections beyond refreshing branding as an efficient electoral utensil.

In fact, according to an article by Privacy International titled Biometrics: Friend or foe of privacy?, BVR systems typically perform only one routine function – that of verifying and ensuring no duplicate registration.

This begs answers on why EMBs in Africa spend such whopping amounts of much-needed funds for a system that plugs only one of the numerous holes in electoral processes.

Apart from vendor dictatorship, BVR systems are also conceptually designed to counter symptoms – not causes – of electoral fraud, and instances of misidentification and inaccuracies are as high as the cost of equipment.

Additionally, BVR systems not only duplicate already existing systems but data storage remains subject to abuse or misuse due to lack of tangible protection mechanisms. BVR systems are also vulnerable to fraud, mainly in the form of data breaches and wrong matches.

During elections, BVR systems have routinely failed to read thumbprints of physical labourers – who form a significant part of Africa’s eligible voters, especially potato and pineapple farmers and the elderly.

Beyond these weaknesses, there is the new factor of electronic rigging (e-rigging) of elections, which is a major source of concern.  As a counter measure, I proposed electronic observation (e-observation).

E-Observation is the branch of election observation that specifically focuses on examining electronic systems and equipment (software and hardware) used during electoral processes.

The writer is an elections expert and currently works as the Head of Research, Information and Advocacy at the Citizens’ Coalition for Electoral Democracy in Uganda.