The Question
This question was posted by a Mongolian embassy official

The revised electoral law (14 December 2011) of Mongolia states that voting from abroad will be possible for the June 2012 elections and the Electoral Management Body of Mongolia has now requested input from the Mongolian embassies and asked them to suggest ways in which voting can be implemented in the various countries where Mongolians are living abroad.

Obviously, the overarching issue here is timing. Considering the short time frame of only 4 months I have the following questions:

1. What are the best ways for involving citizens living abroad in national elections?
2. The experience of which country would you advise us to apply?
3. What issues and challenges were encountered by Embassies when they organized polling stations in their host countries and how they were addressed?

Summary of responses
Several replies focus on the limited time period available and the impact this will have in organising out of country voting.  A number are of the opinion that 16 weeks is inadequate, while others believe that although not ideal, it is feasible (on a limited scale) and that there are precedents for implementing out of country voting on even tighter timeframes.

Given the short timeframe, there is general consensus that the scope and expectations be limited accordingly. It is advised to only establish out of country voting at embassies in countries where a sufficient number of Mongolian nationals reside and that all stakeholders are in agreement on this.

Voter registration is cited as an element that is particularly time consuming. One expert even recommends that voters should be able register at the embassy and then vote on the spot.  Another strongly advises, however, that there is some pre-registration to allow political parties to scrutinise the figures and approve the process. 

Based on the Mongolian electoral law of 2005 (and without knowing what exactly was amended in 2011) one expert raises concerns over the appeal process of the voters’ list and how this will apply to out of country voting.

In addition to arranging the practicalities of voting, emphasis is also placed on the need to clearly specify how votes from abroad will contribute to the allocation of seats.

As well as the limited time available, the financial costs of implementing out of country voting and their practical implications must also be borne in mind. Consideration must also be given to ensure that the timing of tallying and processing the overseas results does not delay the overall election process.

Bulgaria’s experience of out of country voting is given, with clear details of how the process is organised and administered. The 2011 Egyptian elections are cited as a case where voting from abroad was organised within the very short timeframe of one month, albeit in a limited fashion and drawing upon an existing civil registry and a strong information and communication technology infrastructure.

Examples of related ACE Articles and Resources
Encyclopaedia:
• Voting from abroad

Regions and Countries:
• Mongolian Electoral Law for Parliamentary Elections (2005)

External Resources
• Voting from Abroad: The International IDEA Handbook 

Names of contributors
1. Ronan McDermott
2. Stina Larserud
3. Francisco Cobos Flores
4. Frank Vassallo
5. Chris Kyriakides
6. Tihana Bartulac Blanc
7. Velko Miloev
8. Peter Wolf
9. Mounkhou Ravjaa

Hello,

Start with this:

http://www.idea.int/publications/voting_from_abroad/

I do feel that 16 weeks is inadequate to make this work. So be prepared to limit the scope of your effort to what can realistically be implemented in the available time.

Good luck!

Ronan

First of all, I completely agree that the overarching issue here is timing. To organise voting from abroad in 4 months from scratch, deciding on and implementing registration, technology development, MoU with host country, voter information, staffing, dissemination of electoral materials and staff training, campaigning, observation, security, not to mention the polling itself, counting, appeals processes and much more seems difficult to say the least. These things take time for any electoral process, but one that includes the possibility to vote from outside the country has particular challenges that need to be factored in when timing is concerned. Registration is probably the most time consuming part of this, if there are no ready made/permanent and well-updated lists available.

You will find quite detailed descriptions of the main options available in terms of actual procedures (proxy voting, postal voting, voting in diplomaic missions and electronic voting) together with timeline, budgeting, logistics etc. for the introduction of external voting in the IDEA publicaion Voting from Abroad. I believe that chapter 6 will be of most interest to you as it covers the introduction of external voting more specifically. You will also find many country case studies to illustrate the different options. The link to the publication is here http://www.idea.int/publications/voting_from_abroad/index.cfm (as mentioned by Ronan above) and the link to chapter 6 is here http://www.idea.int/publications/voting_from_abroad/upload/chap5.pdf

Without knowing the details of the actual law in place (I understand it has not yet been translated?), it is also important to mention the need to specify not only where and how out of country voting will take place, but also how the votes will contribute to the seat allocation: i.e in what district should the votes be counted towards the election of one or more representatives? There are several possible solutions here, all with their own administrative and political pros and cons. Should the out of country votes be counted in an ”out of country district”, and contribute to the election of one or several out of country representatives in the legislature? Should they be counted in the home district of the individual voters? If so, how will the home district be determined? Should they be counted in one or more districts in the home country (e.g in the capital)? Which one and why? This has to be established in the legal framework well in advance of polling.

First of all, I completely agree with the other opinions expressed. From a practical angle, main issues are determining who will participate (normally a minimum number of registered -at Embassies- citizens in a country/region are established to make the effort worth. So, start gathering figures from registered Mongolians abroad and based on figures on how many are registered and maybe how many are considered to not having registered decide where you put a realistic limit on citizens abroad to focus your efforts (not every one will be able to vote, sorry). Then, decide on registration and voting methods. With so little time on your hands, I would almost suggest that you do this in one round and register people and let them vote on the spot. If not, time will run out. I know it is not the best and most orthodox option, but I think the most practical one. Again, look at the documentation already mentioned to you but stick to the basics with the time available. Most important is also here to involve other stakeholders (specially political parties) into deciding places and methods to move on credible elections.

Good luck. 

Hi,

I agree with Ronan that 16 weeks is inadequate especially considering you have not done this before. In an attempt to answer your questions, use your embassies. However be selective, you do no have to set up overseas polling in all of your embassies. The tiny country of Lesotho in southern Africa does this, perhaps worth looking at how they do it. Challenges are, unfortunately many, even with good manuals etc.

Frank

[Looking critically at the question posed it is noted that no actual mention is made whether there is a pre-existing Voters Roll (including overseas voters) or whether Voter Registration is a pre-requisite that has to be completed beforehand. Based on the responses thus far I am assuming in my reply that there is no such pre-existing Voters Roll for out-of-country voters. ]

[According to the IFES website, I believe that the June 2012 Election is actually Legislative Elections with 76 seats being contested. Also, I came across,  a draft version of the Mongolia Electoral Law for Parliamentary Elections dated 2005 – not sure what the latest amendments or final version is though; ( see http://aceproject.org/ero-en/regions/asia/MN/Parl%20Election%20Law_%20DRAFT_11-04-2005.pdf/at_download/file)
For the sake of brevity we’ll refer to this “2005 draft version of the Electoral Law” as the Electoral Law]

======= Voter List, Electoral Law and available time =========

I agree with earlier comments that timing is rather limited and expectations must remain realistic based on what can be achieved within such a short timespan. Furthermore, it should be borne in mind that for a number of activities the actual “usable” timeframe is considerably more limited. The Electoral Law Art 19.4 states that:

19.4 Governors of soum, districts, baghs and horoos shall compile in duplicate list of voters residing in their territories…

…

and submit them to the division election committee 30 days prior to the polling day.

Not sure if there is an amendment on this draft law. Now article 19.6 states that the EMB must publish the [Provisional] Voters Roll publically at least 15 days before polling day. The appeal process is mentioned in Art 20 however the question that must be asked is: 
    Will squeezing the appeal process into the 15 day period be adequate time for out-of-country appeals? 
Furthermore, Art 20.2 states that

20.2 A division election committee shall consider the complaints within 3 working days from receipt and make appropriate changes in the register, or disregard the complaint and respond to the complainant.

Next, to make matters worse, in Art 22.1 it is stated that:

Voters registered in the list of voters shall be issued voter certificates at least 10 days prior to the polling day.

Does that mean all appeals have to be raised within the first 2 days and handled within just the next 3 days? If this is the case then Out-of-country appeals would have to be handled at the Embassy level as there would hardly be enough time to transport the appeal documents back to Mongolia, never mind process them. In such a case,  how would out-of-country voter registration appeals be handled? I do not think it would be practical to have a judge presiding over such appeals at each participating Embassy.

It is also noted that no mention is made of a publication period for the Final Voter List prior to proceeding to Elections – nonetheless, such a step would be particularly prudent on the part of an EMB. To press the point home consider what could happen in the event that the [Provisional] Voter List announced just 15 days before polling begins actually underwent a significant number of changes owing to the appeals process (in say a hotly contested district or at an overseas Embassy). If any candidate lost by a narrow margin there is a good likelihood that he/she may resort to crying foul and blaming it on these last minute changes.

===== Casting of out-of-country votes on Elections =====

As Stina mentioned, it important to reach clarity on how overseas votes cast will be counted against seat allocations that are contested below national level elections (e.g., Legislative, Provincial, Council). In my opinion there is no clear-cut solution that fits all country requirements. For example,

• ·      if overseas votes were to be cast towards individual contested seats (all the way from Legislative down to Councilor level based on the original in-country origin of the voter) then the logistics associated with getting the right ballots to the correct embassy or consular offices would be incredibly complex and pre-destined for failure. (Even handling just the simpler Legislative Election may prove too challenging and prone to errors as, based on the “mapped in-country” demarcation of participating voters, not every Embassy would require the same subset of contested Legislative seat ballots nor the same number for each contested seat. The complexity becomes exponentially more challenging for Local Councilor elections).
• ·      Art 44.1of the Law requires casting of votes in person. Now, if casting of votes at an embassy into separate ballot boxes (per contested seat) is assumed for the lower level elections then this is most likely impractical as the number of ballot boxes required would make it unworkable. Such a voting setup may work for the in-country voting but not necessarily be pragmatic for out-of-country voting. For out-of-country voting it may just boil down to deciding “what is the simplest manageable method that is free, fair and transparent that is still permitted under the Electoral Law?”
• ·      (Francisco briefly touched on the issue of the distribution of voters in overseas countries. I would like to press that point considerably further…)
  Another even more worrisome aspect is when out-of-country votes are considered to be cast for specific constituency then the secrecy of the vote may no longer be safeguarded and thus be in contravention of Art 44.6 and Art 8.1 of the Law!
  To elaborate should the number of out-of-country ballots cast for a specific seat in any non-National-level Electoral Event (e.g., Legislative, Provincial and Councilor) be very small then the secrecy of the ballot can no longer be safeguarded. Not being able to safeguard the secrecy of the individual vote can have other negative implications on the credibility of elections where the voters may feel vulnerable or unprotected. 

Also raised by Francisco is the possibility to consider a less rigorous registration process. However, as I am not familiar with the public and political party level of trust enjoyed by the Mongolian EMB and Embassy authorities then I would urge that the expectations of political parties be “managed” by at the very least requiring out-of-country voters to pre-register with an Embassy, possibly by using a Passport (and if available a National ID) as a reference. Political Parties must be given the opportunity in good time to get their heads around these diaspora numbers and if they wish to raise their concerns/objections/reservations before the Electoral Event they should do so. (Looking back at the timelines stated in the “draft 2005 Law” I suspect not enough time has been provisioned for this). It would prove greatly beneficial to reach broad consensus before heading to the Polls.

We must remember that if ever a Voters Roll can be brought into question then it almost always will be used as a scapegoat – with or without just cause. By extrapolation, if the validity of the Voters Roll can be cast into doubt then, in turn, the validity of the Electoral outcome will also be cast into doubt!

If permitted by Law then I would urge that consensus be sought amongst all (EMB, Supreme Court and Political Parties, CSOs...) that overseas voters will cast their ballots only for National Elections – i.e., the Presidential Election or for a single representative seat at Legislative or Provincial Level (customarily this might be chosen to be the Capital). I am not clear on how large the diaspora community of Mongolia is nor the estimated distribution of citizens within each country -- the merit of the above recommendation must be considered to have been made with access to no statistical information.

Another aspect not yet raised is how firm is the Election date set? In other words would there be some flexibility in postponing the Election Date by a reasonable period so as to ensure that the out-of-country voter registration and polling process can be agreed to and implemented with adequate due-diligence and also ensuring a mutual consensus of all stakeholders prior to pressing onwards to the Polls?

==== Timing of announcing Electoral Results =====

The time available for an EMB to announce Provisional and/or Final Results after voting has closed is also another factor that must be taken into account. Sometimes this limit is explicitly stated in the Electoral Law. In any event it is advisable to aim for announcement of results as early as possible to avoid suspicions of irregularities. For Presidential usually within 72hours of closing of polls is a recommended target; Lower level elections progressively longer times.  In any event a politically acceptable solution must be sought such that the tally and acceptance of the overseas results at each embassy does not delay the overall process.  Art 48.2 states that results must be announced within 15 days following the completion of the elections (sooner is always recommended if at all possible).

Another finer point that may sometimes be overlooked is the exact Polling Station opening times and closing times for each country. The Law states:

40.1. Polling shall be held at the polling stations from 7 a.m. until 10 p.m.

However, no mention is made for overseas locations – would this be 7a.m. to 10p.m. based on the overseas country’s time or Mongolian time (GMT +8)?
In the event that the EMB is prohibited by Law from announcing any results until all polling stations have closed or, at their discretion, the EMB deems it inappropriate to announce results before all polls have closed (so as not to inadvertently influence voters that have not yet cast their votes) then rolling in-country results announcement may have to be delayed until all Polling Stations worldwide have closed. Such a delay may also have an impact on the timeline for announcing of aggregated results.

When focusing on the “academic” aspects of an Election the spotlight is sometimes turned away from more down to earth realities. One such issue that must be raised is the financial implication -- we all recognize that EMBs have limited financial resources. Depending on the process to be followed, overseas voting usually burdens an EMB with substantially higher costs per vote cast. (I am particularly interested in what exactly will be the financial implications of Art 9.1 below within the context of out-of-country voting… enough said)

9.1. The following expenses connected with the organisation and holding of elections shall be financed from the state budget:

…

9.1.6. expenses to be incurred for overseeing of the parties’, coalitions’ and candidates’ election financing and expenditures;

…

9.1.10. office supplies, stationary, postage, communication and transportation for election committees and per-diem expenses of their officials;

Also, if it is customary for in-country voting that party representatives observe the election procedures see Art 43.1

43.1. Parties, coalitions and independent candidates shall appoint observers to ensure the freedom, fairness and transparency of elections.

As well as, see text from Art 44.2 that I underlined

44.2. A voter who is unable to appear at poling station for the health reasons shall make a written request at least five days prior to the polling day. On the basis of such request the list of voters whose vote shall be obtained through a sealed mobile box shall be made separately and upon approval of the list and route by the division election committee meeting at least two members of the division election committee representing different parties shall visit such voter and obtain his/her vote.

Then who pays for such observers on Election Day at Overseas Polling Sites? Ordinarily, according to the Law as it relates to in-country voting is silent and it is understood the parties have local representatives in areas that they are contesting. Can such local representatives be found by parties at overseas embassy locations (not necessarily embassy staff) that can act as political party observers and mitigate such costs?

On the one hand, despite the sizeable costs sometimes associated with overseas voting, the actual percentage of overseas registered voters (against the total number of voters) may in fact be far too small to make any meaningful impact on the outcome of an Election. On the other hand however, in many countries the diaspora financially supports family members back home and it may be important in such scenarios to accommodate the vote of the diaspora into the equation so as to promote acceptance of the electoral outcome by all.

Nonetheless, I would recommend that to keep costs realistic (and to also keep the process more manageable) that only Embassies having a certain minimum number of registered voters should be considered for participation in the Election.  Again, it is most important that all stakeholders reach mutual consensus on this.

While organizations providing technical electoral assistance recommend six months lead time to organize an election, including voting from abroad, elections in transitional democracies, and in particular the out-of-country component, have been organized on a much shorter timeline.  While not ideal, organizing an election on such a short timeframe should also be possible in less challenging contexts such as Mongolia (especially if restricted to embassy voting).  Some of the recent examples of elections in more challenging contexts include the out-of-country vote organized for the South Sudan referendum in 2011 and Iraqi vote in 2010. In both cases the entire operation took between two and three months, and while IOM and UN were heavily involved in South Sudan, the Iraq vote was managed directly by the Iraqi EMB, with advice provided by UN and IFES. In 2005, due to the very short time remaining to prepare for voting from abroad, the Iraqi EMB organized it entirely on its own, while the UN confined its role to providing technical assistance only with the in-country vote, with a much longer preparation period.

One of the most important issues to consider when it comes to voting from abroad is the cost of such vote. When organized on a more massive scale (in person, using multiple locations outside of host country capitals and outside of the embassies), the cost per voter can reach well above $200, which is more than four times the cost of some of the most expensive in-country elections. The reason for such high cost is precisely the short lead time, but also the cost of international logistics and security arrangements (transporting and securing materials and people in multiple countries). In addition to these costs, the turnout is always much lower abroad than inside a country (although the cost per voter would be lower if calculated using the number of registered voters, reliable registries are even harder to compile for voters abroad than for in-country voters).

In addition to the timing and cost, eligibility criteria for in-country voters often needs to be interpreted or defined more closely to apply to voters abroad, a process which can be extremely controversial and slow. Assuming eligibility criteria is defined, there are rarely existing and reliable databases of potential voters abroad and potentially eligible voters may have limited documentation, and so reaching and registering such voters can be extremely challenging.

To address some of the challenges above, countries tend to limit voting from abroad to host countries with higher number of potential voters and to embassy voting (which can be combined with voting by mail where infrastructure allows for this voting modality).

IOM and IFES have significant experience advising on and conducting voting from abroad, and IDEA’s Handbook on Voting from Abroad is an extremely useful resource including case studies that may help answer some of your questions.

If I correctly understand the Mongolian question, it might be about formally meeting legal requirements and political demands, without necessarily expecting significant turnout figures and a perfect voting process. Thus I tend to agree with some opinions above that Out-of-Country Voting (OCV) could be organized in a pretty short time if limited to embassies and provided that the relevant legal and budgetary arrangements are in place.
My country, Bulgaria, has a 20 years long and not quite easy history with OCV. Below are some simple and hopefully useful rules from the 2011 Electoral Code.

● The EMB – the Central Election Commission (CEC) - must organize OCV for all types of elections, except for the municipal ones. Generally, CEC administers the process, supported by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) and the embassies or consulates.
● Polling stations are established in cities where embassies or consulates exist, provided that at least 20 voters have declared their intent to vote. For other cities 100 such declarations are required. Here and throughout the Electoral Code precise deadlines are prescribed, like the requirement for heads of embassies to seek permission for OCV from the hosting authorities not later than 70 days before E-day.
● MFA and embassies are obliged to post the rules for OCV on their websites.
● Polling station committees (PSCs) are appointed by the CEC on proposal of the MFA and following consultations with political entities. (Party quotas and consultations are usual for the appointment of all election commissions in-country, too.) There must be at least one representative of MFA in each OCV PSC. The government covers their expenses if they have to travel.
● The CEC is mandated to “train” OCV PSCs, but actually they just receive the usual CEC “Methodological Guidelines” (kind of polling and counting manual).
● Ballots are sent by air, while forms are downloaded and printed locally.
● Formally, embassy heads compile voters lists based on voters’ declarations of intent to vote, but everybody who shows up on E-day with a valid passport or other ID (proving citizenship) is added to the list and given a ballot, upon signing another declaration excluding double voting.
● Within 24 hours after the closure of the polls, the OCV PSCs email to the CEC scanned results sheets. Hard copies of all documents are sent with the first diplomatic mail.
● Out-of-country votes are added to the parties’ totals at national level (to calculate the 4% threshold and for the initial seat allocation).
● Appeals related to OCV go straight to the CEC.

After a long experience of errors and legal or procedural corrections, OCV for Bulgaria works reasonably well now, in my eyes at least. OCV has mostly symbolic and emotional importance, except for OCV from neighboring Turkey, where there is a large population with double citizenship and with a traditional voting pattern in favor of a particular Bulgarian political party. Concerns and allegations for serious violations in Turkey appear to have been addressed, to some extent, by sending government representatives to serve at the PSCs there.
Other issues like overcrowded and chaotic polling stations (in Western Europe or in the US) largely appear to be linked to bad (local) management. Such cases receive a lot of negative media attention, but certainly have little, if any, impact on election results.

The out of country voting system set up for the 2011 elections in Egypt is another good example:
 
The number of Egyptians residing abroad is unknown, but estimated between 6 and 10 million. For the 2011 Elections the decision to allow voting from abroad was only taken one month before the election.

After this decision a process was set up that allowed Egyptians residing abroad to either register online or through a consulate. This registration process was open for 10 days and about 355,000 citizens registered during this period.

Once registered, voters could download their ballot from the internet, print the ballot and vote. The ballot had to be put in an envelope and the envelope had to be mailed to the consulate, together with a signed authorization letter containing the voter's personal details and national ID number.

Alternatively voters could also visit a consulate and complete the procedure above in person.

The consulates handled all received ballots directly. They marked the corresponding voter on the voters list to detect and prevent attempts of multiple voting and eventually counted all accepted ballots.

The process went reasonably well, but even EMB officials will admit that it had its limitations that had to be accepted given the extremely limited timeframe.

It is also important to note that the process was not implemented in a vacuum and could rely on several important building blocks that were already in place when the decision for voting from abroad was taken:

* A national voter register, based on Egypt's civil registration system was already available. Only citizens included on this register were able to request to vote from abroad.
* Strong ICT infrastructure and qualified personnel to operate it was in place for other parts of the electoral process. Voting from abroad was 'only' an additional module of an already existing system.

This reply is posted on behalf of Mounkhou Ravjaa, Embassy of Mongolia, Sweden

Dear Friends,

I wish to thank you very much for assisting us in getting ACE experts’ views and suggestions on organizing voting from abroad.

Please find attached a copy of my Ambassador’s letter of gratitude to all those who kindly shared with us their views and experiences on the issue. I would appreciate it if you transit the copy of the letter to all those who commented on the questions we had asked. We have sent their comments and suggestions to the Mongolian Authority for Election. We are confident that the Authority will find them useful.

Wish you all the best.

Best regards,

Mounkhou Ravjaa

Counsellor

Embassy of Mongolia

Sweden