As expected, the total vote recount (see related story) did not produce any significant changes, in terms of seats going to another candidate or even party. Based on the number of complaints by politicians and the Central Voting Bureau’s own observations of possible irregularities, the decision to again count the votes at each of the 20 districts nevertheless appeared justified.
However, it’s an extremely painstaking process, which took two more-than-12-hour days of work plus a third half-day to complete. With all due respect and deep appreciation for the relatively small group of people who performed this marathon task on behalf of society, that seems a bit ridiculous.
Still, keep in mind that a few votes here or there could make a difference under other circumstances, in case of closer results. Especially to those directly involved, that would logically be a big deal.
Small mistakes in tallying and recording the numbers were made by voting bureau personnel, while a considerable number of voters filled in their ballot erroneously. The main issue regarded invalid votes declared valid on review.
The problem is that it also happens the other way around, so that checking the stacks of invalid votes alone would not be enough. Distinguishing between the two to some extent remains a matter of interpreting the rules.
What can help is to keep educating the public that only colouring in the blank dot next to one candidate’s name with the red pencil is permitted, nothing else. Hopefully the decision to show and explain examples during the live broadcast of this week’s public hearing and on the front page of this newspaper contributed to raising awareness in that sense.
Electronic voting would be the obvious answer to much of this, as well as not getting a preliminary outcome until sunrise the next morning. There is understandably concern about hacking, but many countries have secure and efficient elections in that manner already for years, which at least they claim are confidential, reliable, free and fair.
