The EC(electoral commission) introduced the biometric system which was used to register voters and also will be used to verify voters on the day of voting, let me add i feel is a great step in technological plus to the nation Ghana and also in our democracy.
Recently the register has been opened to the public for all who registered to go and check if their details are as they should be. Surprisingly, just a few days into the exercise and most people have come out to complain that they can not find their names in the register.What? How can this be since the machine accepted the details and then printed out a hard copy of the voter's id card to them, therefore anybody with a hard copy id card, we assume the machine must have already saved his/her details first(common logic). So what exactly went wrong?
This is what i think happened(based on my knowledge on how the system works and my IT background as well as personal thoughts)?
To begin with there were not sufficient technical people who could operate or repair the system when it developed some faults, which it did countless times during the registration period. There were instances in my area(Ledzokuku) when there were no registration going on not because people were not around to register but the 'system was down', at least that was what we were told.
There could be hours of no activity because they had to wait for the technical personnel to fix the machine or close for the day when the personnel did not show up.
Another technical factor was what i term as 'the work force' of the machines provided. The machine could only register a certain number of persons per day(that was reported by some radio stations), mean while the registration exercise was suppose to start at 8am and end at 4pm if i remember correctly. So imagine if by the early hours of 11am the machine registers its maximum for the day, what will happen to the rest of the people left, come back another day? That's bad but the million-dollar question is was that done or people were registered just to satisfy voters?
Recently the register has been opened to the public for all who registered to go and check if their details are as they should be. Surprisingly, just a few days into the exercise and most people have come out to complain that they can not find their names in the register.What? How can this be since the machine accepted the details and then printed out a hard copy of the voter's id card to them, therefore anybody with a hard copy id card, we assume the machine must have already saved his/her details first(common logic). So what exactly went wrong?
This is what i think happened(based on my knowledge on how the system works and my IT background as well as personal thoughts)?
To begin with there were not sufficient technical people who could operate or repair the system when it developed some faults, which it did countless times during the registration period. There were instances in my area(Ledzokuku) when there were no registration going on not because people were not around to register but the 'system was down', at least that was what we were told.
There could be hours of no activity because they had to wait for the technical personnel to fix the machine or close for the day when the personnel did not show up.
Another technical factor was what i term as 'the work force' of the machines provided. The machine could only register a certain number of persons per day(that was reported by some radio stations), mean while the registration exercise was suppose to start at 8am and end at 4pm if i remember correctly. So imagine if by the early hours of 11am the machine registers its maximum for the day, what will happen to the rest of the people left, come back another day? That's bad but the million-dollar question is was that done or people were registered just to satisfy voters?
So now the question i ask the EC is, what will happen to those who do not find their names in the register?
But i in all think the EC has learn his lessons and will provide adequate measures the next time. God bless Ghana.