Basis of Challenges
Challenges to or complaints regarding voters in voting stations could be made about the following:
• the behaviour of the voter within the voting station;
• the issuing voting material to a voter believed to be ineligible to vote at that voting station;
• the denial of a vote to a voter believed to be qualified to vote at that voting station.
Voter Behaviour
Regarding voter behaviour, the voting station manager must be given and be prepared to use powers to remove or arrange for the removal from the voting station of persons who:
• are intimidating or otherwise threatening other voters, officials, or observers;
• are intoxicated;
• refuse to surrender weapons when entering the voting station (excepting security forces undertaking their voting operations security duties);
• are not authorised to enter the voting station;
• are in any way threatening the security of election materials or the secrecy of voting;
• remain unauthorised in the voting station following completion of their vote;
• are distributing political material or in any way advertising political allegiance or attempting to influence other voters' ballot choices.
Voting station officials should take a proactive role in monitoring behaviour within the voting station. They also must be prepared to react swiftly to investigate any complaints about the behaviour of other persons in the voting station made by other voters, party/candidate representatives, or observers.
In societies emerging from conflict, or in the midst of bitter political dispute, voters, and particularly party/candidate representatives, may have very sensitive perceptions about the behaviour of others in voting stations. In such environments, some training on conflict management and resolution techniques would be appropriate for voting station managers, if not all voting station staff, during their operational training sessions.
The voting station manager's report on voting activity should include details of complaints about voters' behaviour and instances where persons were removed from the voting station.
Voters threatened with removal from the voting station must first be given the opportunity to behave in an acceptable manner.
If a voter refuses to leave the voting station or any designated area around it on request by the voting station manager, assistance should be sought from security forces. Voting station officials should not generally attempt to remove voters by force themselves.
Official Verification of Voter Eligibility
All voters should be questioned, by voting station officials prior to being issued a ballot, as to their identity and eligibility to vote in the election and at that voting station.
Where, as a result of such questioning, the voter is denied a vote, details should also be recorded, as this issue may be relevant in any later challenge to election results (and in evaluations of voter information programs, particularly regarding voters who have turned out to vote at the wrong voting station).
Challenges to Voters
It would be usual that the legal framework gives voting station officials the power to challenge or formally object, in the voting station, to a voter being issued a ballot. This may be on the grounds of eligibility to vote, multiple voting, or impersonation of another voter.
In some systems, party/candidate representatives may also have this right.
This may have some practical additional effect where voting stations are servicing relatively small numbers of voters in a distinct community.
However, allowing challenges in the voting station by party/candidate representatives may lead to retributive, rather than fact-based, challenging by all party/candidate representatives. This would disrupt voting without enhancing voting integrity.
Resolution at Voting Station
Where challenges to voters are resolved at the voting station level, there needs to be provisions for a formal statement giving reasons for a challenge, formal response by voters, and determination of eligibility by voting station managers.
Where this method is used, arrangements should be made for voters who can satisfy the voting station manager of their right to vote to resume their original place in the voting queue.
Resolution Following Close of Voting
It would generally be regarded as less disruptive to the voting process that such objections are recorded and resolved following the close of voting. Methods by which this could be implemented include:
• allowing the voter to vote in the normal fashion after providing a formal declaration of eligibility to vote, officially recording the objection or challenge, and requiring such objections to be considered in any ballot recount or result challenge proceedings;
• issuing the voter with a provisional or tendered ballot, which is enveloped with the voter's identity information, to be checked after the close of voting to determine if the voter was eligible to vote.
Records of challenges to voters must be treated as highly accountable material, as they may be relevant to any post-voting day challenges to election outcomes.
Area for Dealing with Challenges
To minimise disruption to the service being provided to other voters, challenges to voters within the voting station should, if at all possible, be dealt with away from the tables or areas used for issuing and marking ballots.
Dealing with these at the voting station manager's table and (if allowable under election frameworks) a special area for taking declarations from voters or issuing provisional or tendered ballots is preferable.
Validity of and Omissions in Voters Lists
The validity of the entries on the voter’s lists used in voting locations is an aspect of voting operations that can be highly contentious. The issue is whether validity should be subject to complaint and challenge. In some jurisdictions challenges to validity are barred.
There are two issues here. The first is the accuracy of the compilation of the voter’s lists, that is, whether the processing of voter information to produce the voters’ lists has either:
• omitted or incorrectly recorded details of valid registered voters;
• included details of persons not entitled to be registered.
In systems where voters’ registers are open, that is, there is a method available to voters who have been omitted from the register to vote through means of a declaration as to their eligibility or by provisional ballot, or where voting day registration is available, this can be dealt with in the context of the voting procedures.
In systems where the voters’ registers are regarded as closed, that is, unless the voters' information can be found on the voters list they are denied a vote, it would seem that this would be a valid basis for challenging the election results, to determine if errors in compilation of the voters list were sufficient to affect election outcomes.
The second issue relates to the validity of claims to registration by those voters who have been accepted for registration and who consequently appear on the voters list:
• Where there has been reasonable public opportunity for challenge and equitable resolution of challenges to the acceptance of a person's claim for voter registration, through objection, revision court, or other facilities, at the voter registration stage, this would seem to be an issue no longer capable of challenge.
• Where such reasonable opportunity has not been provided, it would seem that it should be legally allowed as an issue capable of challenge during and after voting.
Complaints about voters’ registers inaccuracies are not something to be resolved on the spot by individual voting station managers. Where significant problems in this regard are encountered, they should be immediately relayed to voting operations administrators. Once voting has commenced amendment of the actual voters lists being used is generally not practicable, and may be a questionable exercise at best. However, omissions or incorrect information on voters’ lists can be dealt with by allowing, within the legal framework means of provisional voting, voting following a formal declaration of eligibility or additional registrations being accepted on voting day.
Where voters’ lists are based on civil registry records, provision can also be made for voters omitted from their correct voters list to receive, on voting day, certificates from the civil registry attesting to their eligibility to vote in a particular area and use these to establish their eligibility at the voting station. The success and equity of this method will depend on the accessible locations of civil registry offices and the costs and capacities of civil registries to handle this workload.
Post-Voting Day Challenges
Challenges to election outcomes may be based on complaints about the accuracy of voters’ registers (see above), significant levels of impersonation of voters, voting by ineligible persons, and multiple voting (see Management of Challenges and Complaints).
It is vital that all records relevant to voter eligibility, persons voting, and challenges to persons voting remain under strict security at least until any time limitations for election challenges has elapsed.
