Fiji unveils new ballot boxes

Transcript

Fiji's Elections Office has unveiled the ballot boxes which will be used in this year's elections.

The 2,500 boxes funded by the Japanese government at a cost of 46-thousand US dollars will be used at 800 polling stations to be set up around the country.

The plastic, transparent boxes were displayed alongside a wooden box used in past elections at a signing ceremony in Suva last week.

Sally Round spoke to the Elections Supervisor Mohammed Saneem after the ceremony.

MOHAMMED SANEEM: The type of ballot box is a significant achievement for Fiji because in the past several elections we have had wooden boxes which were very heavy, which we couldn't see through, and all sorts of observer reports out there to back up the need for change in the ballot boxes. And we are grateful to the Japanese government for agreeing to fund the purchase of the ballot boxes. And as we showed you, our ballot boxes in this year's elections are plastic, easy and light to carry, very durable and also transparent so you can see your vote fall into it.

SALLY ROUND: How tamper proof are these boxes?

MS: The ballot boxes are secure in terms of there will be seals that will be placed on the ballot boxes in the morning and there will be witnesses to the seals that are all numbered. And then in the afternoon the seals will be then broken in the presence of an observer, probably a polling agent or an independent person to verify the number on the seals from the mornings in the record, and then in the evening the same seals to be broken. And the plastic is tight, the lid is tight, and there's no chance of any slippage through the sides except for the main opening that is for ballot papers. And on election day there will be a person called the ballot box guard whose main responsibility is to ensure that only the ballot paper falls inside the ballot box and no other material.

SR: Have these boxes been used around the world?

MS: Yes. These are boxes used everywhere. And you can check, several countries use this, Nepal used it, it was provided by Japan for them as well.

SR: So a significant milestone in the run-up to elections. What else is there for you to do to ensure these elections are free and fair?

MS: We are working on several aspects of the election. At this point and time we are training polling day workers, 16,000 people to work on election day. By Friday this week we will have trained about 7,000, actually 6,350 people would have been trained by this week, Friday, and the remainder will be trained in the following weeks. We are also working on the logisitics angle of the election. We are working out how to get there to all these various polling stations, and what to take, how to take, and when to take it to. And we expect the writ to be issued in the earlier part of next week. Following that we get into nominations and the nomination period starts for another 14 days from the date the writ prescribes it.

SR: Some NGOs are concerned groups out there are concerned about the transmission of data, of results from remote polling stations to the centre here. How can you assure them that this is not going to happen? I understand some groups are also trying to have technical observers as well for the election. Is that going to be allowed?

MS: Observers are dealt with by the Minister of Elections, I will not comment on that. We have not received any comments, any such doubts by any NGO as you claim so we will not comment. At this year's election there are two types of results. One is a provisional result which is transmitted on the night after count. This can either be transmitted in any one of the means by telephone, by SMS, or by an app we are working on. This result is not, is a provisional result, which is just to assist a person to understand that this is the way the voting went in this polling station. Thereafter the result is actually transmitted via a tamper-evident envelope that contains the results protocol which actually contains the formal results that will be in the final national results tally. So that's how result transmission will be done.

SR: And how do you respond to political parties who say that the doubt the independence of your office?

MS: The Fiji Elections Office aspires to have the greatest amount of transparency and integrity in its functions and we are fully committed to ensuring, as our mission statement reads, to ensure that there is a right to vote, to ensure that there is secrecy of the ballot, the principle of one vote person, one vote, one value is maintained and held in the highest level that we can. We value honesty, integrity and transparency, we have the highest regard for independence, and we are all independent, we signed to be independent and we have a very strong code of conduct on independence. We value professionalism and impartiality, and we are an apolitical organisation.

SR: Some other political parties have also said they don't feel it is a fair playing field, that they can't compete with the incumbent government. Do you have response to them?

MS: We have not received any such complaints or reports, and it is only something we will comment on if we receive anything formally from any of the parties.