Permanent voter cards
Wednesday April 25 , 2012
The Federal Government, recently, approved a N2.6 billion contract for the production of 40 million permanent Voter Cards. The new cards will replace temporary cards hitherto used for elections in the country.
The new permanent cards will have security features such as hologram, micro-text, barcode, fingerprints and embedded chips with printed voter details. They are expected to have lifespan of ten years if well cared for, and will be produced at N65 each. The contract, awarded to ACT Technologies, has delivery period of seven months. Government says this is only the first phase of the project. Seventy three million cards were produced for the 2011 general elections.
Ordinarily, the decision to introduce use of permanent voter cards should be welcome. It will end the era of issuance of fresh temporary voter cards for every election. Up till this moment, promises that temporary cards would be exchanged for permanent ones before actual election dates have never been fulfilled. It may be expedient, therefore, to have permanent cards that can be used for all elections. Moreover, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) is well within its power to produce the cards since Section 16 of the 2010 Electoral Act (as amended) mandates it to print and issue voter cards to all registered voters.
But then, the use of a multiplicity of cards for different purposes may not be in the best interest of Nigerians. This is more so because of the proclivity of politicians to abuse voter cards. The nation must not ignore the possibility of politicians hijacking and warehousing the proposed voter cards for use in future elections. One good way to ensure that the cards are not obtained and hoarded by political interests is to merge the new Permanent Voter Cards with the National Identity Cards (ID) scheme such that the ID cards have all the features required in voter cards.
All Nigerians can then be provided with ID cards with biometric information and other security features that will make them suitable for use in elections. This is the practice in some developed countries, which use their National Identity cards for voting during elections. This proposal, if adopted, will prevent a situation where political interests amass voter cards to compromise integrity of elections.
The Federal Government will, however, do well to determine the actual mode and number of cards required and ensure they are delivered in good time. The voter card used for past elections had no security features at all. The coming one should be properly considered to ensure that it has critical features that will make it difficult to fake. It should also have comprehensive biometric information. Every effort must be made to ensure that names of the dead, the non-existent and foreigners do not get on the coming voter cards. INEC must also do all it can to perfect the voter registration process. A situation in which registration officials engage in experimentation with the voter registration machines should be avoided this time.
The electoral agency must also get on top of the electronic registration process to ensure that all required data, and fingerprints, are captured on the permanent voter cards. The agency has all the time now to perfect the features of the desired voter cards, and the processes for obtaining them. Its officials should not be fiddling with computers during the collection of data for the cards.
Above all, let the cards be of high quality. They should be truly permanent and the number to be produced should tally with that of registered voters, and not any arbitrary figure. The authorities should work towards convergence between National Identity Cards and Voter Cards.
Very importantly, too, the government must determine and provide for a reliable means of storage of voter cards to ensure that they do not get into the hands of political parties which could use them to compromise elections. The quest for permanent Voter Cards, three years to the next general elections, is already raising eyebrows in some quarters.
All problems identified with the voter registration exercise and the issuance of voter cards in past elections must be guarded against, this time. Ultimately, government should strive to provide Nigerians with a one-stop identification that can be used for elections, taxation and other purposes. This will help the quest for a national database that will not be directly linked to elections, thereby reducing the tendency for manipulation of the voter identification system.
