Lack of Documentation

Not having any papers at all is one of the biggest problems in the voter registration and identification systems in Africa and South and Central America.  Many countries require some documentary evidence of identity and residence, and most of Latin America requires a national ID card – which requires documentation, such as a birth certificate -- to obtain. Many of these countries are impoverished, some have undergone years of armed conflict, and many have large numbers of internally displaced persons (IDPs).  These conditions lead to large portions of the population lacking documentation of any kind.

The number of people in Latin America who are undocumented is in the millions. These individuals cannot even start the process of registering to vote. They must first overcome oftentimes difficult barriers, including foremost obtaining a birth certificate, which can be very complicated, before they can register to participate in elections.  Although the data is less specific regarding this problem for Africa, it is clearly a major challenge in a number of countries on that continent too.

Honduras presents an example of how a complex process can thwart citizens from becoming documented. In Honduras a person who was not registered at birth will have to apply for a birth certificate in order to get the national ID card. To register the birth of a child, one or both parents must go in person to the civil registry office in the municipality where the birth occurred and fill out a birth registration form. One or both parents must present their own identity card and a medical certificate for the birth, if the birth took place in a hospital. If the child was born at home, the birth report must be provided by the midwife or by any other person who attended to the birth. That report must contain, among other information, “the midwife’s name, the number of her identity card, her place of residence, her signature confirming that she was the person in charge during the birth, and photocopies of the identity cards of two witnesses.”[i] These requirements present an array of potential obstacles: the parents may not have identity cards; travelling to the municipality may be a hardship; the midwife may not have an identity card; and so on.

According to UNICEF,

In sub-Saharan Africa, more than half of all births are unregistered. In some cases, impoverished families cannot afford registration fees or the cost of travel to a registration site. There is also a lack of awareness, particularly in rural areas, of the potential benefits…Birth registration in West and Central Africa is further complicated by armed conflict. Displacement throughout the region has left thousands of unregistered refugee children who have no legal identity and often no access to formal schooling, health care or other social services. In Côte d’Ivoire, for example, the armed conflict is rooted in ethnicity, and the citizenship of ethnic groups from the north has been challenged on the basis of birth documentation. New regulations have withheld national identity cards unless a birth certificate is produced to verify citizenship, and the process of verification

is lengthy and complicated.[ii]

The overwhelming majority of the Sudanese population has no identification papers. [iii]

a. Who are the Undocumented?

The problem of lack of documentation is not unique to any one group, but it is much more prevalent a problem in certain communities.  These include the indigenous, displaced populations, people living in remote rural locations, and those living in poverty.

The Indigenous:  The largest population lacking documentation in Latin America is the indigenous. Throughout the region there are huge numbers of indigenous with no identifying documents whatsoever. In Ecuador, as of 2007, the civil registry estimated at least 1.5 million unregistered citizens, about 10 percent of the population, mostly among the indigenous population in the Amazonian provinces. 500,000 were of voting age.[iv] In 2009, again the Civil Registry estimated roughly 500,000 qualified voters, primarily from the Amazonian indigenous people, were not registered.[v]

The Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) estimates that 10 percent of Guatemalans lack any documentation, including birth certificates, while 40 percent of indigenous Guatemalans are undocumented.[vi] Some analyses conclude it could be as much as 50 percent among rural indigenous, especially women.[vii] Some Guatemalan experts estimate that approximately one million Guatemalans lacked identification in the last election.[viii]

The 2001 census in Bolivia found that nearly 10 percent of Bolivians had no identity documents, while the National Police, who are responsible for disseminating ID cards, estimated that 30 percent of Bolivians had no documentation. Other reports claim percentages of undocumented in indigenous communities as high as 50 percent, in a country where 62 percent of the population is indigenous.[ix]

The Displaced: Many Latin Americans and Africans are undocumented because they were displaced during civil or regional conflicts and their documentation was either destroyed, stolen, left behind, or lost. Among these, Guatemala and Colombia stand out. In Guatemala, the war caused the displacement of between 400,000 and one million people.[x] As part of the Agreement on Resettlement of the Uprooted Population Groups of 1994, item 7: [xi]

7. The lack of identity documents in the majority of the uprooted population increases their vulnerability, limits their access to basic services and their exercise of their civil rights and their rights as citizens. This requires urgent solutions. Consequently, the Parties agree on the need to take the following measures:

7.1 In order to facilitate issuing identity documents to uprooted individuals as soon as possible, the Government, with cooperation from the international community, will emphasize its efforts to expedite the necessary mechanisms taking into account, when pertinent, the registries of the uprooted communities.

7.2 Review of Decree 70-91, the temporary law to replace and register birth certificates, civil records destroyed by violence, to establish a system that is adequate to the needs of all affected populations with registration procedures that expedite said procedures free of charge. For these purposes, the opinion of affected sectors will be taken into account. Identity and personal documents will be issued as soon as possible.

The Temporary Law on Personal Documentation, which was originally meant to take effect from 1998 to 2001 but was extended to 2003, was an attempt to make issuance of ID cards more flexible, in recognition of the difficulty those affected by the armed conflict would have in getting the ID under existing rules. It ultimately proved insufficient[xii] as many citizens remained excluded from the process.[xiii]

In 2011, according to the Colombian government around 3.9 million people were internally displaced in Colombia.[xiv] According to the independent Observatory on Human Rights and Displacement (CODHES), the figure was around 5.3 million.[xv]

According to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Center there were an estimated 9.7 million IDPs across just 21 sub-Saharan African nations in 2011.  Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Somalia continued to be the countries with the largest internally displaced populations in Africa.[xvi]

Research conducted on behalf of the Economic Community of West African States noted that the internally displaced in West Africa often lack of identity documents, reporting, “IDPs often lack basic documentation, which can also preclude them from being able to exercise their political rights, such as the right to vote. For example, an estimated 80 percent of Ivorians displaced in the 2010-2011 post-election crisis have lost their civil and land tenure documents.”[xvii]

The Rural and the Poor: It is not surprising that the combination of poverty and living in a rural or remote area is highly associated with a lack of documents. For example in Bolivia research shows that poverty is the biggest factor associated with lack of documentation.[xviii] With respect to Ecuador, the European Union has reported that the undocumented population “is located in remote, non-accessible areas along the borders with Peru and Colombia, as well as in certain areas of the coastal provinces… Since the Civil Registry offices are located in provincial and cantonal capitals, citizens living in rural and remote areas have fewer possibilities to register.”[xix] In Nicaragua, the European Union reported that it is particularly difficult for indigenous populations, who tend to have higher rates of poverty and illiteracy and tend to live in remote areas, to obtain identity cards.[xx]

b. Examples

As noted above, in Bolivia in recent years, lack of documentation among much of the population, and consequently voter disenfranchisement, has become a major problem, especially among the indigenous.[xxi] Poverty is the biggest factor associated with lack of documentation, followed by the issue of the undocumented communities living in remote areas of the Amazon.[xxii]

Lack of documentation is also a problem in Cameroon. While there is no specific data on how many people are without documentation in Cameroon, United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) uncovered high numbers of Cameroonians who were not registered at birth and therefore are unlikely to have birth certificates, a prerequisite for getting other documents. Various studies have found in recent years that only between 70 and 76 percent of Cameroonians are registered with the State. Citizens in rural areas are much less likely to have had their birth registered. If one was not registered at birth, one must go through a judicial procedure to become registered, which can cost between $20 and $200USD.[xxiii] Other data show that children of minorities, street-children, and other vulnerable children are more likely to remain unregistered. The registration of births by the poorest quintile is 51% while the richest quintile registers at a rate of 91%.[xxiv]

Insufficient Institutional Capacity

Lack of capacity to fully, efficiently and effectively implement a voter identification system, especially one that requires one particular type of document to vote, is widespread among the nations of Africa and Latin America.  Many countries start out with ambitions of having a uniform voting document only to find it impossible to effectively provide that document to all eligible voters in the country.  Lack of resources, skills, manpower, and environmental and geographical challenges are just some of the barriers governments and elections administrators confront.

This observation should serve as a flag for those countries that seek to go in the direction of making their identifications systems more complicated or more high-tech.  Good intentions may fall to the reality of the conditions on the ground.

Whatever voter identification process a country decides to adhere to, it must first ensure that it has the capacity to implement the process properly so that all eligible voters are able to meet the requirements. For example, countries that believe that fraud is widespread and can only be addressed with a national ID system will have to take measures to assure that all citizens have the resources, access to, and ability to obtain the national ID promptly. If a country intends to make registration a two-step process whereby people register and then later must obtain a voting card it should have the staff and equipment in place to carry out both stages. States that wish to require the capture of biometric data in the registration and identification process must have the funding, skills, training, and equipment to do so in a sustainable, economically feasible, uniform and efficient way. This has not always been the case.

a. Examples

Over the last several years the voter registration process in Cote d’Ivoire has been quite dysfunctional. In 2009 The Carter Center reported that the registration and identification process was continually delayed due to factors overlooked by the original implementation plan. The technical teams for registration often found that many people came without the requisite documentation, especially in rural areas. As a result, people had to rush home to come up with the necessary documents. “Local government offices were overwhelmed with the demand, were often distantly located, photocopiers were unavailable in rural areas, birth certificates were difficult to trace on the basis of existing identity cards, and applicants faced additional costs if they had to submit a judicial request to receive a birth certificate.”[xxv] The statement went on to say that “the public demand for the required documentation could not be met for several months, forcing people in the former rebel zone (CNO) to await the arrival of mobile courts as well as the launch of the process to reconstitute civil registries. Overall, the documentation requirements and practical difficulties of complying with the process may have excluded certain categories of the population, notably the poor.”[xxvi] The European Union (EU) observer report from 2010 discusses the launch of a biometric registration phase in Cote d’Ivoire, conducted through a French legal company. “Technically complex and crystallizing the profound lack of confidence between the political parties, the voter registration phase was prolonged from six weeks initially planned and lasted 10 months.”[xxvii] The 2012 Carter Center report was similarly critical of the complex procedures and last minute legal changes.

The government of Uganda launched a new photographic registry in 2001. When used in 2006, at least 2 million people were not able to obtain their ID cards. In 2010 the commission was better prepared but the president demanded that they begin again with a new biometric system using fingerprint technology. Everyone had to register anew. Four million people registered, but their ID cards were never produced.[xxviii] According to the Commonwealth, although the law provides for the issuance of voter cards, the commission decided not to use them because they did not have the resources or time to issue them; therefore, the only identification requirement at the polling station was to have one’s name on the registration list.[xxix] The country is still trying to implement the new biometric system, but as of this last year only 400 cards were issued.[xxx]

Kenya, a country that requires the use of a national ID card for registration and voting, has also confronted capacity issues. A 2012 National Democratic Institute (NDI) report noted, “In July 2011, news reports indicated that approximately four million youth were in danger of disenfranchisement due to non-issuance of national identity cards. This was attributed to inadequate material resources to facilitate registration and to issue identity cards, which had resulted in the Ministry’s suspension of issuing new national identity cards between January 2011 and July 2011. While the process has since resumed, it is believed that millions of youth remain under threat of disenfranchisement.”[xxxi]

Many countries develop systems without sufficient analysis of their ability to carry them out. This has frequently been the case in Africa where breakdowns in the system have led to voter disenfranchisement. Whatever a country decides to require for voting, it must first make sure it has the capacity to implement the process properly so that it does not exclude voters as a result of technical and logistical failures.

b. The Particular Problem of Requiring a National ID

Many political actors in Africa, including election management bodies, express a desire to move toward a national ID system for the purpose of voting and other transactions. There is nothing inherently objectionable about the concept of a national ID card. However, the capacity of states to implement a national ID program in such a way that it does not cause disenfranchisement is an issue. It is unclear whether most states in Africa are in a position to do so, and the results are mixed among those countries that already have such systems. For example, in Kenya, whose logistical challenges have been discussed, it reportedly takes two to six months to obtain an identity card,[xxxii] which can mean some voters may not have it in time to register to vote.

The experiences in Latin America, where most countries require a national ID to register and vote, are instructive.

Honduras represents a rather dramatic example. The process of obtaining an ID card can take between four to six months.[xxxiii] The National Registry of Persons (RNP) reportedly has one million ID cards that have not been distributed as people have tired of continually returning to RNP offices to find the card not yet available and therefore have stopped trying. The problem is that the RNP only prints cards one day a week; the printer is so old that this is all it is capable of.[xxxiv]

In Guatemala, the plan in 2007 to re-register the entire population was badly mismanaged, a fact that was compounded by outright corruption. In 2011, many Guatemalans did not have the new ID card before the vote took place. Some people did not pick them up, some went only to find the card not ready, and some found that the cards contained mistakes. As a result, the Congress was compelled to amend the law to extend the validity of the old identity cards through January 2013.[xxxv]

Before the 2010 election in Colombia, the Consejo Nacional Electoral (CNE) reported that 1.2 million citizens had applied for identity cards but had not picked them up.[xxxvi] One of the difficulties is that the government sends out mobile units to register people -- but often then the people must travel on their own to an urban center to get the ID. In some areas the only way to travel is on the river by boat and this is complicated and expensive, too expensive for many. There have not been enough efforts to distribute the cards in remote areas. Moreover, it can be dangerous to travel in some areas given the ongoing conflict. In some cases people are not even aware that they need to pick up the cards because there is no mode of communication.

In Nicaragua, the failure of the election management body to deliver identity cards in 2011 resulted in protests and violence in some areas.[xxxvii]

Direct and Indirect Cost to Voters

One significant issue impeding voter registration among the poor is the direct and indirect costs associated with registering and obtaining documents. Particularly problematic are countries that require a national ID card and charge for that card or the underlying documents required for that card —what in the United States would be referred to as a “poll tax.” For example, Cameroon charges the equivalent of more than $14 for an ID card. In 2011, to encourage registration in advance of the election, the government lowered the cost to approximately $5.39,[xxxviii] and ultimately made them free for the registration period.[xxxix]

With respect to Peru, The Ministry of Economics and Finance found a few years ago that

The population living in poverty or extreme poverty is not in a position to assume the costs that are really necessary when completing all the processes to have personal documents issued. In this sense, getting a birth certificate is free, but it is impossible for this population to afford the expenses involved to travel to the nearest health post and request a birth certificate, and for this reason birth certificates cannot be issued massively. For this same reason, this part of the population does not always register births, and registering the children later on is impossible for them because it can cost between S/.5.00 [$1.96 USD] and S..50.00 Nuevos Soles [$19.63 USD] in some municipalities. The possibility of having a DNI later on entails a registration cost of S/.23.00 Nuevos Soles [$9.00USD], a rather high cost for the aforementioned sectors since it represents 20% of their per capita monthly income.[xl] 

In Ecuador, where 37 percent of the population lives on $2 per day, ID cards cost approximate $2. In one province, the ID costs $10.[xli] Similarly, in Brazil many poor, rural people do not have the money to get to the county seat to register.[xlii] As referenced, in Colombia, the government has sent out mobile units to register people, but with a few exceptions they must travel on their own to an urban center to pick up the finalized ID. In some areas the only way to travel is on the river by boat, a complicated and expensive means of transport.[xliii] In El Salvador, renewal of an ID costs more than $10 USD.[xliv]

There are also fees attached to acquiring an identification card in Guatemala. An ID costs 85 quetzales,[xlv] although by law “individuals who are part of the social groups that RENAP’s Directorate determines as not having the economic means to pay for the DPI” can obtain the ID for free.[xlvi] The IADB reports low income precludes affording the indirect costs of processing a registration, such as the trip (travel from the village to the administrative center of the municipality), the loss of work hours, etc., in addition to the direct cost of the document (neighborhood card or the process to register the birth certificate when it was not registered on time), since the Civil Registry offices are located in the cities that serve as administrative centers for municipalities.”[xlvii]

There are a handful of countries that have largely managed to address the problem of ensuring that all citizens have the identification documents they will need in order to vote; others have, by necessity, created an alternative avenue for registering and voting without documentation.  They have been able to do so by acknowledging the issue in the first place, putting in a great deal of concentrated work, and investing a significant amount of government resources.  Peru is leading the way to demonstrating how a country where numerous people are poor and may be in remote areas and have no documents can be reached and provided with the power of the vote.  Panama provides an example of a country in which the problem of lack of documentation is largely avoided.  Finally, there are countries in Africa that allow citizens to prove their identity through means other than physical documentation.

In Peru, in order to get the ID card (DNI) required to register and vote one must have a birth certificate. According to a publication of the Ministry of Economy and Finance (MEF), in recent years as many as 871,263 Peruvians of age had no identity documents, most of them in rural and poor communities.[i] The document noted that in many cases there were no government offices in some areas because the villages were so remote; residents would have to devote considerable time and resources to get to an office. In addition, the report found that poverty and lack of documentation were highly correlated. The MEF concluded that,

Based on these references, we can deduce that the population living in poverty or extreme poverty is not in a position to assume the costs that are really necessary when completing all the processes to have personal documents issued. In this sense, getting a birth certificate is free, but it is impossible for this population to afford the expenses involved to travel to the nearest health post and request a birth certificate, and for this reason birth certificates cannot be issued massively.

For this same reason, this part of the population does not always register births, and registering the children later on is impossible for them because it can cost between S/.5.00 and S..50.00 Nuevos Soles in some municipalities. The possibility of having a DNI later on entails a registration cost of S/.23.00 Nuevos Soles, a rather high cost for the aforementioned sectors since it represents 20% of their per capita monthly income.

Lack of economic means by a portion of the population leads to most of them not having a Birth Certificate, and without this document it is impossible to do the necessary formalities to have access to a DNI, hence increasing the undocumented population.[ii]

The MEF also cited the conflict of the 1980s and 1990s as another reason for the high number of undocumented in Peru, as the conflict resulted in many damaged civil registry offices and registry books.[iii]

Peru however has confronted these problems and devoted resources to tackling them effectively and continues to do so. According to the election management body’s (RENIEC) most recent strategic report,

As of December 31, 2012, RENIEC had identified a total of 26,444,052 Peruvians who have a DNI, which represents 88.8% of the country’s population. 19,250,609 of this total number of people with DNI are Peruvians of legal age who reside in Peru, which represents 99.7%, and 7,193,609 are minors, which represents 66.9% of the country’s population of minors. If you compare these figures with 2006 figures, you can confirm that by 2010 a total of 8,480,881 more Peruvians have been identified as having a DNI. Of this total, 1,841,887 are of legal age and 6,638,994 are minors, hence highlighting the growing importance of issuing identifications for minors in recent years in the country… To carry out these tasks, RENIEC has a nationwide coverage of 235 registry offices, agencies and service points, as well as 48 auxiliary registry offices - ORA located in MOH Hospitals and ESSALUD in most of the 25 regions of our country.[iv]

RENIEC has also attempted to address the issue of persons with disabilities without documentation, most recently by establishing a government working group and launching a campaign to provide identity cards to people in institutions.[v]

According to a report of the Inter-American Development Bank,

RENIEC successfully developed and implemented a national plan for the restitution of identity as a result of a final report generated by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. This commission was established in 2001 to investigate events that took place during the internal conflict in Peru, which spanned two decades. During this period, an estimated 70,000 people were killed or disappeared, and many were internally displaced. Moreover, local registration offices, along with the registration books, were burned completely or vandalized, which left a number of individuals without documentation and consequently extremely vulnerable…

RENIEC has undergone important institutional transformation since its creation, and it is now recognized as one of the most efficient, sustainable, and transparent civil registries in the region. Throughout the last five years, RENIEC has expanded the reach of its services to get closer to the denizens, not only by setting up more offices but by travelling to and providing services to the most remote areas of Peru and by offering services using the internet and other communication methods. As these actions have helped RENIEC reach the neediest and most marginalized populations, public confidence for the institution has grown over time.[vi]

Nonetheless, the problem of undocumented citizens does persist in Peru, and the government continues to work at it. Early in 2012 there were reports that RENIEC was carrying out an investigation in areas that continue to have high levels of undocumented persons to learn more about the causes and to develop strategies that take into account culture and geographic challenges to documentation. Many of the undocumented in Peru are in rural jungle areas. As a result, according to reports RENIEC was planning to provide services free of charge, travel to communities by river to service them, and incorporate members of the indigenous communities into the registration process. RENIEC is also working with UNICEF to continue to tackle the registration of births and delivery of ID cards. Since June 2011 the two entities have collaborated to provide registration and documentation services to 69 Amazonian communities. “In Ucayali, in the central Peruvian jungle, RENIEC recently reached the locality of Puerto Esperanza, in the province of Purus, to process and issue identity documents to the locals. RENIEC’s personnel arrived in the area, which can only be accessed by plane, to accompany members of the Foreign Relations Commission of the Congress of the Republic. 83 DNI applications and 60 identity documents were issued in that jurisdiction.”[vii]

In Panama, virtually everyone is entered into the civil registry at the time of birth and issued a birth certificate and an identity number.[viii] To a large degree this is because some 95 percent of the population is born in hospital[ix] where a registrar is on site. Upon turning eighteen, one must petition the Electoral Tribunal (TSE) for a national ID card (“cedula de identitdad”) and upon receiving it will be included on the voter registration list automatically. The national ID card, sometimes called a personal identity card, is required to vote.[x] Because photographs are included in the voter registry at each polling place, the hope is that in the future there may be no need for a voter to produce the physical card.[xi]

In order to acquire the ID card one must present his or her birth certificate or the identification card of one parent. If one has neither, one can provide other types of evidence, such as witnesses, to prove birth in Panama, a process referred to as “late registration.” The local official generally decides if the evidence is sufficient. However, for cases on the border with Colombia, where there is a history of non-Panamanians attempting to register, the materials are processed at the TSE headquarters in Panama.[xii]

With respect to those Panamanians who are undocumented, who were not registered at birth, the state has undertaken significant efforts to get them documentation. The state also does a great deal to publicize the voters’ list so that if someone is not included or his or her information has changed (e.g. address), s/he can make the appropriate changes to the list. The TSE also campaigns through use of the media and the Internet; in new housing developments, shopping centers, and transportation hubs; and through notices included in payroll checks and electricity, telephone, and water bills.[xiii] According to the president of the TSE, the Tribunal also campaigns in “traditional Panamanian handicraft fairs throughout the country and tours isolated places in the country with the voters list.”[xiv]

Lack of documents is pervasive in Africa and many countries simply do not have the resources or capacity at this time to ensure that all citizens get documentation in the way that Peru and Panama have strived to do.  Yet these governments realize it is important that members of all communities, especially in post-conflict situations, have access to the election system when one has been established. As a result, they have provided alternatives to documents for the purposes of voting.  Typically, this comes in the form of allowing for some kind of witness attestation as an alternative. 

For example, although elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo have failed on many levels, with respect to the law on voter identification procedures legislators and elections officials have recognized that many Congolese may not have possess any documentation.  Therefore the rules allow for a number of alternatives in order to facilitate enfranchisement. The Democratic Republic of Congo’s (DRC) 2 Law No. 04/028—Identification and Enrolment of Voters in the Democratic Republic of Congo (2004)—requires in-person voter registration for all citizens. The local registrar can vouch for the identity and nationality of the applicants himself or herself. Otherwise, the applicant must provide one of the following:

• A certificate of nationality or a document attesting that you have applied for a certificate of nationality;

• An identity document;

• A national passport;

• A national driving license;

• A national pension book;

• A pupil or student card; or

• A service card.

If the potential voter has none of these documents s/he can take an oath before the office of the registration center which must be witnessed by five people registered on the electoral roll for that registration center who have lived for at least five years in the district. Upon so doing, the applicant is to receive a voter card on the spot.[xv] The voter card is to be presented at the polls on election day.

A description of the Ugandan process by the International Criminal Court noted that, “Because the Electoral Commission is aware of the problems people have in obtaining proof of identity and does not wish to set the bar too high and discourage people from voting, they will register people who do not have any form of identification on the basis of a confirmation from others, such as neighbours, that they belong to a particular residential area.”[xvi]

Political and election administration leaders on both continents seem to at a minimum express a desire for biometrics and in some cases have infused, or are in the process of infusing, their registration and documentation systems with biometrics.

Although biometrics can help address the problem of multiple registrations and thus in that respect increase trust in the legitimacy of the process, it is unclear what precisely is driving such a strong and pervasive move towards biometric technologies in registration and ID cards across Africa and Latin America at this moment. Biometric technology is expensive, requires training and sufficient staff to implement, and necessitates that all the citizens at some point re-register and/or get the new card. At the same time it only addresses one aspect of potential fraud: multiple registrations. Multiple registrations may or may not be the gravest problem confronting a country’s electoral system.  Moreover, multiple voting, which is the true concern, can be addressed through low tech alternatives such as use of indelible finger ink on Election Day and greater transparency and wider spread publication of the registration list in advance of elections.

Moreover, launching a new biometric system, because it can be so complex and vulnerable to so many different variables, such as environmental and geographical challenges, lack of training and skills, mechanical breakdowns, delays, and usually necessitates to re-registration of every citizen in the country within a finite period of time, can cause disenfranchisement. As Michael Yard has pointed out, “A new way of doing things should not be judged either as good or bad simply because it is new, but should instead be evaluated upon the basis of whether it helps to make elections more or less democratic given the resources, risks, and alternative solutions available.”[i]

Are politicians truly moved by the desire to address duplicate registration and voting or is there some other political interest that drives them? What outside pressures exist? Perhaps technology companies or the international donor community have taken action that is facilitating or accelerating the race to biometrics?  There does not seem to be any strategy, cost/benefit analysis or long term thinking when it comes to this subject among most of the parties involved.  It is still unclear whether biometric technologies are the most efficient use of resources given the particular problems individual countries in Africa and Latin America confront. In some cases increased use of biometrics may make sense; in others it may address a less than urgent problem and only make the process more complicated. These issues require further exploration. Although there have been a small handful of technical studies of biometric systems, little research has been done on the advantages and disadvantages of deploying such a system in the first place.  It appears that the only work that has addressed this issue head on is the report Voter Registration in Africa, an edited volume published by the Electoral Institute for the Sustainability of Democracy in Africa (EISA).

Richard Atwood, writing for the European Parliament, has stated, “EMBs and donors like the EU should… take care that new technologies adopted to prevent registration fraud – like biometric technology – do not themselves lead to citizens’ disenfranchisement...For example, due to the cost of biometric kits, countries may purchase fewer and rotate them round the country, which can reduce the time available for communities to vote and may increase the distance they have to travel to do so. Note also that biometrics – if they work -only resolve multiple registration. They can’t resolve issues of identity…Any erosion in the EMB’s integrity through its procurement of costly equipment will increase risks of conflict and outweigh any of technology’s potential benefits.” [ii]

Moreover, no matter how sophisticated a system is used, if there is lack of faith in the management body responsible for implementing it, it will not help increase trust in the integrity of the elections.

There are countries that have implemented biometric systems relatively successfully, but at the same time one must ask at what financial cost in the immediate and as important the long term in maintaining and upgrading the systems going forward, at the sacrifice of other needs.

There are countries in both regions where biometric technology is being used to varying degrees. Countries that have or are moving toward biometrics include Kenya, Bolivia, Cameroon, Colombia, Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, Guatemala, Venezuela, and Uganda.

a. Foreign Vendors

Procuring biometric registration technology from foreign vendors can be fraught with potential difficulties, particularly if they then hold the technological expertise and capacity to maintain and improve the systems to the exclusion of the election commission and local technologists. “If it is not possible to retain adequate in-house staff, the EMB should carefully consider whether there will be adequate funds to pay for continued support from external vendors, and whether fostering continuous dependency on external vendors is in the best interest of the EMB."[iii] If a government contracts with a foreign vendor, depending on the state’s internal capacity, “the system may be difficult to use in future registration exercises when donor participation in the electoral process is likely to dwindle.” [iv]

According to the EISA report, in the DRC for example, external stakeholder influence on the process was very high.

This was clearly manifested in the following activities:

• The tender process was handled by IAPSO Copenhagen.

• The number of foreign technical assistants used was high, turning the process into a veritable international affair.

• The decision on the choice of the system used was not mooted by the CEI alone. There were reports that some of the major donors at the time (like the European Commission) had clear preferences when it came to technological choices…[v]

EISA further points out that

It may be difficult for some EMBs to analyse and fully understand study results

presented by vendors who are eager to sell their products. Simple studies are

good for obtaining a rough overview of a system’s performance; however,

more in-depth studies are crucial before a system is deployed to ensure that real

performance will meet EMB requirements and that the system is fully operational

in specific country conditions...Case studies conducted in an air-conditioned office using college students are not a realistic representation of how the voter registration system would work in extreme African conditions.[vi]

b. Implementation Problems

As Astrid Evrensel writes in the EISA publication’s introduction,

Even international donors and technical electoral advisors seem to support the use of biometric-based voters’ rolls and other high-tech solutions to deal with integrity issues and possible political challenges to elections. A registration process that uses sensitive high-tech equipment not only adds significant ‘integrity’ costs to the core costs but also increases organisational and logistical challenges. These include the increased need for technical training as well as continuous supervision and support for registration staff in the field to ensure that the data is captured, collected and processed to the highest possible standard. If EMBs lack organisational and logistical resources while attempting to organise such a complex task, the resulting voters’ roll can be replete with errors. If the voters’ roll is too faulty, polling staff may not even use it on election day. Following generally accepted principles, the voters’ roll should be as accurate and complete as possible to provide for maximum inclusion of all groups. Voter inclusion and the enfranchisement of disadvantaged groups have to be balanced against the security features of a system, which prevent double registration by technological means…[vii]

Echoing Atwood, Evrensel also points out that “Travelling long distances to registration centres disenfranchises thousands of voters especially women, people with disabilities and others who cannot journey easily for whatever reason.”[viii]

There is also the problem of the false positive and the false negative. “A person is falsely rejected, for example, when s/he is already enrolled in the database but the system fails to positively identify her/him. The false reject rate depends on the situation under which the system is used, such as operating conditions and user cooperation. A slight change in one’s fingerprint due to dust, moisture or other environmental conditions can increase the false reject rate. A person could be falsely accepted, for example, when one person’s biometric data is similar to another’s and a match is made erroneously.”[ix]

There are also those citizens for whom recording a fingerprint is not possible and mechanical failures that lead to an inaccurate or unclear recording. “In Zambia in 2010, for example, a ‘failure to acquire’ rate of over 10% was observed at field level in the system’s attempt to capture the digital fingerprints of voters. In other words, even before any further processing of voters’ data, already 10% of voters are excluded from the system’s attempts to detect double registrations because of technological registration issues…”[x]

In a sad example in Kenya recently, an 82 year-old man was turned away after a BVR kit failed to detect his fingerprints. IEBC clerks at the station tried their best several times but failed to register Mr Ole Nzuka, even after he washed his hands. Mr Nzuka who had trekked for more than 10 kilometers from Kibiku area to register in Ngong as a voter told The Standard, that he was under medication yet he failed to register.”[xi]

EISA further argues that

[T]here are numerous ways in which an election can be stolen, and devoting massive resources to advanced registration techniques – even if they are well implemented and work perfectly – may simply displace fraudulent activities into other areas of the process. Electoral authorities and donors are attracted by the opportunity to make improvements to their systems rather than to address the more sensitive and difficult problems of misconduct by politicians, political parties and voters. These actors may in fact be happy to see the EMB and donors pursue a course of action which, in reality, would not disrupt their entrenched activities…[xii]

c. Examples

One example of biometrics gone awry is Fiji. Michael Yard writes for IFES that

In 2009 there was a strong push in Fiji to include automated fingerprint identification as a requirement for every person on the voter list. Responses to the question of how this would improve voter registration were wide-ranging, with expectations that it could eliminate impersonation at the polling station, remove deceased persons from the voter register, and prevent registration by non-citizens and underage voters. None of these issues were addressed in any way by the proposed technology. A survey of political party members and field election staff indicated that there was very little concern about persons registering more than once, the one issue that the proposed system could help to address. … Identifying the problem is not always a simple exercise. Surprisingly, the aforementioned survey also indicated there was minimal concern about impersonation, deceased persons, underage voters or non-citizens. Even the largest city on the islands was small enough that poll workers knew almost every voter who came to cast a ballot. The biggest problem raised in stakeholder discussions was suspicion that some parties were bussing voters from polling station to polling station, allowing multiple voting – a suspicion that, according to most observers, was completely unfounded and was only used by losing parties to cast doubts on the legitimacy of the ruling party. So, the main problem was really a lack of trust, which could have been more effectively addressed by voter information, publicizing the controls that were already in place to prevent bussing in voters.[xiii]

In the Democratic Republic of Congo, the biometric registration exercise reportedly cost $58 million.  In a case study of the Congo, it was found that “US$40,160,000 was needed to buy the 10,000 biometric registration kits and to have them transported by air from Brussels to Kinshasa. Apart from these initial costs, the CEI would have to raise a yearly or second yearly budget of some US$2.5 million1 for equipment maintenance and replacement of lost or damaged equipment to ensure the continued use of this technology.”[xiv] And yet it still resulted in disenfranchisement. “[T]he system was not able to capture most people because the number of units acquired was not sufficient to cover the entire country (especially the outskirts), and people who had to travel several kilometres to register either missed the chance or found it too difficult to make the effort.[xv]

In 2007 the election commission in Guatemala (RENAP) decided to completely overhaul the system using biometrics. This overhaul required all Guatemalans to re-register and get new identity cards to replace the old ones. In a report published in advance of the 2011 election, the International Crisis Group (ICG) described this process as having been fairly disastrous:

The exercise was overambitious from the start. Planners misjudged the time required to retrieve and sort old data from municipalities and then collect and verify new data from around fourteen million Guatemalans. The bad design was compounded by corruption. Deputies in Congress and RENAP’s managers, who have since been replaced, reportedly awarded contracts inappropriately, or at least without sufficient transparency. Ill-qualified cronies were appointed to key positions. The combination of poor design, nepotism and incompetence led, unsurprisingly, to a deficient registration. The exercise has cost far more than originally projected but remains incomplete. Politicians, especially from opposition parties, and some in civil society have accused RENAP of inflating registration numbers so as to benefit the ruling party.[xvi]

Sierra Leone used a biometric system for the first time in their 2012 election.  Yet “the integrity of the electoral register has still been questioned by opposition parties who accuse the government of covertly registering individuals under the legal voting age and foreign nationals…In Sierra Leone, there is no historical evidence of a deliberate strategy by any political party to rig elections through multiple registrations. All previous electoral registers have erroneously contained names of the deceased, the under-age and foreign nationals. But the most significant type of electoral misdemeanor has been physical stuffing of ballots and false recording of results by temporary election workers. Both the All People's Congress and Sierra Leone People's Party, when in power, have at times used their position to fund political campaigns and buy voters. This practice remains widespread. Political parties continue to organize and condone the intimidation of voters, often perpetrated by their youth wings. Biometric technology offers little scope to tackle these transgressions.”[xvii]

Kenya started its 30 day process of biometric voter registration exercise on November 19, making it an interesting current case study.  Reviews so far have been mixed.  The Star newspaper says that , “According to the contract, the price quoted by the Canadian Commercial Corporation for the 15,000 [Biometric Voter Registration] kits was Sh6.1 billion (€56.21 million).[xviii]

Some reports have focused on the number of Kenyans who do not have the identity cards necessary to register. One press report stated that four million Kenyans lacked ID cards and that only a small percentage of them had even applied for the card.[xix]

Early on in the process there were problems with the passwords on the registration kits expiring, the lack of sunlight causing solar power failures in the kits’ batteries, and problems with transportation and logistics.[xx]

Article 21 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states, “The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage…” Thus, the most important question when analyzing a state’s democratic system under international law is whether it affords universal and equal opportunity to participate in the electoral process for all qualified voters. This is a broad mandate that all nations should aspire to but few fully meet in reality, including those under review here.[i]

Many other international and regional legal documents, in particular the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), speak to the issue of voter identification in the electoral process more specifically. These documents can aid in judging the degree of countries’ compliance with international norms.

As referenced in the introduction, there are six basic standards that countries must meet in order to fully comply with the most relevant international instruments: (1) any conditions which apply to the process should be based on objective and reasonable criteria, and only reasonable restrictions may be established; (2) obstacles to registration should not be imposed; (3) there can be no discrimination in the law or the process with respect to a number of identified groups including ethnic and racial minorities; (4) there should be no “abusive interference” in the process; (5) governments must take measures to ensure that displaced persons can replace lost or destroyed documentation that proves their citizenship; and (6) states must take active measures to ensure that citizens are able to vote and to facilitate the process of registration, including the identification process.

Most countries are bound to fail at least one of these criteria. However, a few stand out as seeming from this research to by and large meet the standards, most typically because they put substantial resources into ensuring citizens have documentation or given the conditions of the country they have established a scheme that provides sufficient flexibility to be inclusive without incurring any evident significant fraud.

a. Reasonable and Objective Criteria

In the context of voter identification rules, reasonableness must be a balancing test between the need to prevent noncitizens from voting and double voting and the like with ensuring universal suffrage.  In most countries the level of fraud and the ways in which fraud are being perpetrated are murky.  Moreover, it is often the case that the term fraud is over-inclusive so as to encompass acts of incompetence or negligence.[ii]  As voter registration systems become more automated and digital, such problems will decline. In many countries the fraud is more commonly in the nature of illegal acts committed by election officials (e.g. ballot box stuffing), politicians abusing the voting system (e.g. vote buying), and by incumbent governments sidelining the opposition through a variety of means.  This must be considered when analyzing whether an ID regime is reasonable and based on objective data.

Reasonableness must also be assessed according to whether the citizens of a country appear to have few or no problems meeting the identification requirements. In other words, a country’s laws and practices would be considered reasonable if they are working in the interests of its population given the particular political and historic background and cultural environment of that country.

Flexibility in the system used in many African countries usually helped these countries to meet the reasonableness standard as assessed by whether citizens can meet the demands. These more flexible regimes also are based on objective criteria: they take into account the lack of documentation among the population and try to facilitate the participation of a maximum number of citizens.  To the extent that people in countries like Cameroon or Kenya are unable to obtain the single identification card required to register to vote, and this has not been demonstrably proven to be the best or only means to address electoral fraud (an unknown), the laws cannot be judged reasonable or based on the reality of the country’s capacity or environment.

Most countries in Latin America require a national identity card. In many countries this requirement is  arguably not a reasonable restriction on rights because not all citizens have access to that card or the state is not able to competently disseminate such a document. However, there are countries under review here that have such a requirement and are able to meet the standard because they have invested significant resources in order to make the system work. They have been able to achieve high levels of inclusivity by ensuring an overwhelming majority of the country has true access to the necessary documents.

b. Obstacles

A prohibition on erecting obstacles to participation through a voter identification system must include not only those occasions when governments may purposefully try to erect unfair and unnecessary obstacles, but also those instances when the lack of competence or capacity is so egregious that the state disenfranchises citizens by making it impossible for them to acquire the identification required to vote. Interpreted in this way, a majority of the countries included in this study struggle to meet the test.

Charging a fee for any aspect of obtaining identification can be considered an obstacle to participation. Other examples would include major delays or complete failures in delivering identity documents, erecting complex systems for obtaining the identification—such as requiring repeated in-person visits or multiple secondary documents, or a lack of clarity regarding the requirements. Many of the countries included here have experienced these types of problems to the detriment of their citizens’ right to vote and the fairness of their electoral systems.

c. Discrimination

International law does not allow discrimination in any aspect of the voting process, including in the process of proving one’s identity. In Africa and Latin America, while most of the laws regulating voter identification and registration are not blatantly discriminatory, there is pervasive de facto discrimination, most particularly against ethnic minorities and the poor. Throughout Latin America in particular the system discriminates against indigenous peoples who often live in more remote regions, do not have birth certificates, and may speak a minority language. Requiring a national ID card in countries where no serious attempt is made to provide such communities with birth certificates and/or other identity documents or to send mobile units to register and document these groups, would appear to violate the mandate against discrimination in the voting process.

Charging a fee for any part of the process—directly or indirectly—is also discriminatory. While the direct fees can seem insignificant, in some instances they represent a sizeable percentage of a poor person’s income. Indirect fees, such as requiring people to travel long distances to apply for and obtain identification documents are also relevant.

d. Internally Displaced Persons

Internally displaced persons who lack necessary identification documents are a major concern on both continents and countries have undertaken various efforts to address it. Several countries under review have not undertaken the necessary measures and are not complying with this requirement.

The Democratic Republic of Congo has been singled out as implementing a process that made it impossible for Internally Displaced People (IDPs) to get replacement documentation. In Guatemala, up to one million citizens were displaced by the conflict and many of these citizens still are without necessary documentation. On the other hand, Peru actively assists people displaced during its conflict to obtain the documents that they need to participate in the electoral process.

e. Interference

The most obvious form of abusive interference in the process of identification is when governments manipulate that process for political purposes and deny documentation to certain groups and not others. There have been allegations of this in a handful of countries, and found fairly definitive evidence of it in Nicaragua. In Nicaragua the ruling party controls the distribution of identification documents and has been known to refuse such documents to citizens believed to be supporters of the opposition.[iii] Such actions clearly violate an international standard prohibiting interference or intimidation in the voting process.

In a couple of countries there have also been concerns about village or tribal leaders having too much power over the registration process, especially in places like Zanzibar and The Gambia. Village or tribal leaders there are perceived as gatekeepers to the process possessing too much arbitrary discretion. Such influence also potentially constitutes a transgression of the principle of non-interference.

f. Active State Engagement

Some of the countries appear to make an effort to undertake registration campaigns that include providing citizens with documentation and conducting voter education on the identification requirements. For example, reports indicate that in its most recent registration exercise, Ghana made quite extensive efforts to promote and ensure participation. Panama has been very strong in ensuring widespread documentation, and has also publicized the voters’ list in a wide variety of venues and informed people of the need to check this list. Mexico also does a great deal to ensure that people at least have the opportunity to obtain an ID card and register through its use of campaigns, including birth registration awareness campaigns, and mobile offices. Venezuela has made efforts through mobile units and, as indicated, Peru has taken major strides to expand the reach of its registration and identification services.

As it is well established that there is not a one-size-fits-all method for ensuring verification of the identity of voters that is both inclusive and ensures a fair election, principles cannot be overly-prescriptive in nature.  Nonetheless, given the practices identified here as well as international standards that touch upon this part of the voting process, it is possible to identify some areas ripe for inclusion in an exercise in drafting principles and/or good practices.  When such principles or guidelines are further vetted and clarified, it may emerge that some are more directed to certain entities than others, for example, election management bodies, governments, the donor community, international and citizen observation groups, and international electoral assistance providers. 

Some preliminary suggestions are as follows:

a. All parties must recognize the importance of birth registration and commit to ensuring that all citizens have free, timely, and easy access to documents related to birth and citizenship at any age, but ideally at the time of birth.

b. States and election management bodies commit to assessing capacity to implement a voter identification process honestly and transparently, and to conducting effective feasibility reviews

c. There can be no de jure or de facto discrimination in the identification requirements and procedures

d. All stakeholders commit to ensuring  gender equity in the voter identification process and in access to requisite documents

e. Required identification documents should be completely cost-free

f. All stakeholders should be committed to widespread voter education efforts throughout the state with respect to identification requirements and procedures

g. When contemplating moving to advanced technologies such as biometrics, a rigorous analysis should be conducted as to whether such technology addresses the core problems identified in the voting system.  This may include a cost/benefit analysis.

h. When contemplating moving to advanced technologies such as biometrics, stakeholders should also examine matters related to sustainability and the capacity of the state to maintain systems absent international assistance.

i. All dealings with vendors and use of technology should be as transparent as possible in a way that is understandable to the general public.

Laws and policies governing proof of identity in the voting process can have a major impact on the ability of citizens to register to vote and to cast a ballot. Identification requirements of some kind may be necessary,  but too often because of the way they are crafted or implemented, they also cause substantial disenfranchisement, especially among certain communities. Discussion and research in this field has tended to focus on how identification systems can be used to prevent certain types of voter fraud. What has been omitted frequently from this dialogue is whether these policies are also serving to exclude portions of the population from participating in the electoral system.

This paper urges stakeholders to scrutinize voter identification systems and procedures more carefully throughout the electoral cycle.  It is an issue that must be considered during the establishment of the legal framework, design and implementation of the overall voter registration system, funding negotiations both domestic and international, any technology procurement process, creation of the voter education plan, decision-making around resource allocation, and during election observation by citizen and international observers before, during and after Election Day.  Ultimately, it may be desirable to construct a set of principles or at least suggested guidelines to assist all the actors who are interested in free, fair and inclusive elections throughout the world.

The ACE Focus On Voter Identification was written in November/December 2012 by Tova Andrea Wang. Tova Andrea Wang is a nationally known expert on election reform and political participation in the United States and internationally. She is Senior Democracy Fellow at Demos, a Fellow at The Century Foundation, and a consultant to organizations working to improve democracy around the world, such as the National Democratic Institute and The Carter Center. Her work focuses on primarily on voting rights and increasing political engagement, especially among immigrants, communities of color, ethnic minorities, and the poor.

Much of the research for this Focus On was originally funded by The Carter Center and conducted for the publication "Voter Identification Requirements and Public International Law: An Examination of Africa and Latin America".

Voter Identification

full text on one page

Voter Identification

Citizen Disenfranchisement

Ensuring Inclusiveness and Maintaining Effective Identification Programs

Complications in Introducing Biometrics

Laws and Procedures Violate International Norms of Suffrage

Moving Towards Principles for Inclusive And Effective Voter Identification Procedures and Codes of Conduct

Conclusion

Contributors