Voter registration is one of the stages at which there are ample opportunities to manipulate election results. For this reason special efforts should be made to ensure that the voters list is accurate and reliable. Accuracy in this case means that all eligible voters are listed, they are listed only once, and only eligible persons are listed.
Creating and maintaining an accurate voters list requires safeguards and a system of checks and balances. It is vital to keep lists up to date, and to eliminate duplicate registrations and names of voters who have moved out of the electoral district. Equally critical to maintaining electoral integrity is close monitoring and enforcement of voter registration provisions in the legislation.
Ensuring Only Eligible Voters Register
Political parties and candidates often go to great lengths to ensure that their supporters register to vote. They may offer incentives, such as transportation to registration sites or promises of benefits for the area should they win the election. Some parties and candidates go so far as to encourage people to register in an electoral district where they do not reside, or to register even if they are not eligible to vote.
Some persons who are not citizens or are under age may try to register. Others may try to register more than once. Most systems deter and prevent such abuses by requiring proof of identity or citizenship; this is particularly common in countries with a lack of trust in the electoral process or a history of voter fraud. However, integrity may be at risk if the need to prove identity becomes so burdensome that it turns away potential voters. This happened during the 2003 legislative elections in Cambodia: people wishing to register had to produce several identification documents and pay fees to obtain them. [1]
These problems can be avoided by requiring voters to show documents that they may already have or that are easily available, such as a national ID card, birth certificate or passport. There should also be alternatives for people whose papers were destroyed in war or never issued by the government. For example, in the 2000 elections in Haiti, two registered voters could vouch for a third person without papers. The registration numbers of the two guarantors were noted on the voters list and they were held responsible for the truthfulness of their guarantee.
Voter Registration Cards and Accuracy of Lists
Most countries have a list of people registered to vote. Since it is used on election day to determine who can vote, the list must be accurate and protected against any tampering. Along with recording names on the list, some systems issue a card to each voter on registration. The card proves that the person has applied to register and that the application has been accepted. The voter must produce this card at the polls in order to vote.
Voter cards are an integrity safeguard. To be effective, they must have security features deterring unauthorized use or forgery. For example, serial numbers may enable electoral administrators to track cards. If registration fraud is a major problem, special paper may be used to make the cards more difficult to forge. In some systems, the card bears the voter’s digital fingerprints or photograph, and these also appear on the voters list.
Before electoral reform in Mexico, the voters list was largely used to manipulate election results. That is why one of the 1996 reforms sought to make the list accurate. For example, fingerprints were added to voter cards to eliminate the possibility of voting more than once. [2]
Voters lists should also be numbered in sequence so that electoral authorities can track them and check whether any are missing. Lists may be produced in duplicate or triplicate, with one copy for the local election office, another for the regional office and a third for the national office, as applicable. This practice can deter internal tampering, such as unlawfully adding or removing names, since it would be hard to make the same changes to each copy of the list. A voters list is usually posted in a public place so that citizens, political parties and monitors can check the names it contains. The electoral calendar may set a time frame for making corrections to the lists in order to rectify mistakes or remove the names of ineligible persons.
Monitoring
Monitoring of voter registration by a large number of domestic and international observers as well as political party monitors is an effective deterrent to the types of fraud and manipulation most common during this phase of the electoral process. Individual citizens may also act as monitors, helping to ensure accurate registration. They can look at the posted lists and challenge the registration of persons they believe are not eligible. In New Zealand, for instance, every office of the Registrar of Electors has a copy of the entire national voters list, and each post office has a copy of the local list. [3] The lists are open for public inspection. These methods are used in most countries.
Enforcing Registration Law
Enforcement of registration rules and anti-fraud provisions helps maintain a clean and accurate voters list. In almost every electoral system, it is illegal to falsify voters lists. Offenders usually face prosecution.
NOTES
[1] National Democratic Institute for International Affairs, Cambodian Elections: Lessons Learned and Future Directions - Post-Election Conference Report, February 2004.
[2] Schedler, Andreas, Distrust Breeds Bureaucracy: The Formal Regulation of Electoral Governance in Mexico, Mexico City, Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales (FLACSO), 1999, p. 10.
[3] Elections New Zealand, Everything You Need to Know About Enrolling to Vote.