As we woke up today it seems as Mongolia might have a new president. That is what Ts. Elbegdorj thinks himself as he took out a group of followers on the Sukhbaatar Square to celebrate beneath the Chingiis Khan statue. Elbegdorj seemed confident yesterday as he trew his vote in his home constituency Sukhbaatar's 3rd Khoroo. The media coverage was terrific, up to the point where it became impossible for ordinary Mongolians to vote thanks to the hordes of media people.
"- You could not see the voters because of all the journalists, cameramen and foreign election observers." A Mongolian classic á neuvo!
Our little observation team visited seven constituencies, of which five where located in Ulaanbaatar and two in Zuunmod, in Tuv aimag. Two of the visited constituencies where in ger-districts. This year the focus was on consequences of the registration of voters, the dealing with voter cards and identity cards, increasing security at possible expense of voter secrecy, and finally the vote count.
We found some disturbing findings. The problem with voter and ID-cards had been addressed by scanning them through ultraviolet light. Initially the voters had their voter and ID cards marked after voting in order to stop from voting twice. This measure was sensible and would have worked if it had been used everywhere, but it was not. Of the seven constituencies we visited it was used in three. And if it is not used everywhere it does increase the trust citizens have in the election process.
"- You could not see the voters because of all the journalists, cameramen and foreign election observers." A Mongolian classic á neuvo!
Our little observation team visited seven constituencies, of which five where located in Ulaanbaatar and two in Zuunmod, in Tuv aimag. Two of the visited constituencies where in ger-districts. This year the focus was on consequences of the registration of voters, the dealing with voter cards and identity cards, increasing security at possible expense of voter secrecy, and finally the vote count.
We found some disturbing findings. The problem with voter and ID-cards had been addressed by scanning them through ultraviolet light. Initially the voters had their voter and ID cards marked after voting in order to stop from voting twice. This measure was sensible and would have worked if it had been used everywhere, but it was not. Of the seven constituencies we visited it was used in three. And if it is not used everywhere it does increase the trust citizens have in the election process.
Furthermore, the shielding of the voters as the cast their votes has improved lately in is mostly not a problem, but still we found one constiuency where the voters had to turn their backs out exposed, thus making it possible for someone to see how they actually voted. Directly addressed the chairman of the election constituency said that this was done in order to avoid cheating and voting twice. This is an old argument, but is it still a bad one where the security of process is secured at the expense of the voter secrecy; a cornerstone of modern democracy.
In another constituency there was a mirror wall behind the voters, which actually had the same effect. Directly addressed the election committee chairperson said that it was to avoid cheating and voting twice. In this constituency the problem of violating voter secrecy could have been easily avoided by moving the voter screens out from wall, approximately one meter, increasing the distance from the wall to 2.5 meters, then it would have been impossible see what the voter did in detail, but possible in the voters overall movement.
Still the General Election Committee has come up with the idea of altering the places of the candidates, which makes difficult or impossible to easily spot what voter is doing.
The vote count we observed was a mess. It took the staff four hours to start the count, and when we left after seven hours they were still not finished. It was an election with two candidates, how difficult can that be? We saw no direct violations on the Election Law though, even of many manoeuvres looked od.
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