MEC, Mesn ponder US election lessons

The shock of the victory of Donald Trump, the Republican presidential candidate in the United States of America election held on Tuesday, has come and gone.

But various stakeholders in the local electoral process have drawn lessons ranging from the use of technology in registration of voters and vote counting to facilitate credible polls.

Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC), mandated to administer elections, has expressed admiration at the absence of allegations of rigging or claims of maladministration which are common in local elections.

Speaking on the sidelines of a breakfast to view election results at the residence of the US Ambassador in Lilongwe yesterday, newly appointed MEC chairperson Jane Ansah said it was her commission’s wish to one day hold elections using technology.

She said: “Our vision is to utilise technology more in the voting process. The manual process is slow and it is prone to human error. We really need technology and it goes without saying that it plays a big role.”

Ansah, who is a judge of the Malawi Supreme Court of Appeal, said she appreciated the manner in which results were being announced in a timely manner despite the geographical distance to the places where elections were being conducted.

She said: “US is a big country composed of states large in size. But results were getting to tally centres without problems and there were no reports of riots or fighting. It appears that the elections are peaceful.”

Ansah said the proposed electoral reforms currently being scrutinised by a Special Law Commission would address some of the challenges of the previous elections, and most recently the May 20 2014 Tripartite Elections which was marred by anomalies at voter registration and verification stages as well as at some polling stations when it came to tallying cast votes.

On the possibility of Malawi adopting a 50-plus-one system, Ansah said considering the size of the economy, first-past-the-post was the preferred system as it is practised in the US.

“But the reforms are with Law Commission and we are waiting for Special Law Commission to come up with a report [of recommendations on way forward],” she said.

However, Malawi Congress Party (MCP) president Lazarus Chakwera observed that in the US electoral set up, it was difficult for any allegations of rigging or maladministration to creep in due to the decentralised system.

He said: “Decentralisaton of election processes is something we can emulate. The idea that you could have results put together and transported over a long distance to some central place where the announcement takes place leaves room for machinations. That’s one lesson that I have noted.”

Chakwera, who lost in the 2014 elections to President Peter Mutharika, said Malawi was better placed to improve the electoral system with technological advancements due to its small geographical size compared to the US.

He said: “This country is small enough to leap-frog what has taken the US years to develop if we had the will to do that. This is the reason we are pushing for IDs and biometric system. Technology is the future, we had better brace up for it.”

Governing Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) spokesperson Francis Kasaila said the US had once again demonstrated its democratic principles and moved beyond the irregularities which marred the campaign period.

He said as the US has been improving on its electoral systems, Malawi would do the same but not a copy and paste of other systems.

“There are proposed electoral reforms but we need to look at what is practical in our political system otherwise we might find ourselves in a bigger mess than we are now. We need to consult Malawians with the proposals and implement what is feasible,” said Kasaila, who is also Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation.

In the proposed electoral reforms, there is change to biometric voter registration from the optical mark recognition as well as announcement of results at polling centres as opposed to district and national tally centres to avoid manipulation of votes.

However, government has said the Bill on electoral reforms is not ready as the Special Law Commission has not finalised its work, prompting Malawi Electoral Support Network (Mesn) to push through reforms that do not require changes to the electoral laws.

In its briefing paper proposing non-legislative electoral reforms, Mesn noted that changes were necessary in the registration and verification of voters, the delivery of election day materials, management of election results and strengthening of voter information and education.

On registration, Mesn proposed that MEC starts building up an electronic voters’ register using data from the National Registration Bureau and recommended that presiding officers should also be required to post and record election results per polling stream to avoid disparaties in results transmitted to tally centres.

Speaking in an interview yesterday, Mesn chairperson Steven Duwa said electoral reforms could help address the challenges Malawi faced in the last elections in 2014.

He stressed the need to harmonise electoral laws to avoid conflict between theParliamentary and Presidential Elections Act, Electoral Commission Act, among others.

Said Duwa: “More importantly the historic signing of a joint communiqué involving MEC, political parties and Mesn on 14th October relating to the implementation of prioritised non-legislative electoral reforms, if strictly implemented will address challenges of delivery of election day materials, counting and transmission of election results, among others.”

He also agreed with Chakwera and Ansah that advanced technology could simplify electoral processes to achieve credible results.

US Ambassador Virginia Palmer said it was important for countries such as the US and Malawi to continue sharing best practices as even the 240 year-old democracy did not stop learning. She said changes to the electoral system continued in every election.

She said Malawi could learn from improving on the electoral process that the US uses with the aim of making it more transparent by introducing reforms.

“Anything that you can do to make elections more transparent and accountable is a good thing so if your systems are unreliable then that is important,” she said. n