Tanzania, Zimbabwe follow Kenya's use of BVR kits at polls
Plans are underway to introduce Biometric Voter Registration ahead of the Tanzanian 2015 General Election, the country's National Electoral Commission (NEC) said.
Speaking at Dar es Salaam, the NEC chairman, retired Judge Damian Lubuva, told a delegation from the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) that a decision had been made to put the system in place before the elections.“Yes we intend to introduce the biometric electoral system,” he said.
“Adapting a cost effective and simple technology is a good way of solving the many election-related problems plaguing many African countries,” Mr Justice Lubuva said.
This is after Kenya's IEBC used the BVR kits in the just concluded elections but the kits faced technical hitches leading to the failure of the kits and resulting to the manual identification of voters and registration in the march elections.
The Supreme Court yesterday when delivering its final ruling of the presidential election petition recommended the investigation and prosecution of those involved in the procurement of the faulty election technology.
Biometric technology can be used to store unique physical characteristics including fingerprints and facial scans of voters in a database for identification. Justice Lubuva said NEC was planning to float tenders for the acquisition of biometric electoral system, adding that its value was yet to be established.
The NEC chairman refuted claims that the commission was not transparent in the process of acquiring the system. “The whole decision was made by the government, which is our main stakeholder. There is no need of hiding the process from the public. Everything will be known after we complete the whole tendering procedure.”
Justice Lubuva said NEC was independent, and was not being directed or influenced by anybody. “We are working professionally, contrary to what some of our detractors are claiming. We are here to serve Tanzanians, and not any individual or specific group,” he said.
ZEC deputy chairperson Joyce Kazembe also that Zimbabwe was planning to acquire a similar system ahead of this year’s general election. But analysts expressed doubts whether this will ever see the light of the day due to mounting cash problems and the squabbling between rival principal partners in Zimbambwe.
Kenya’s IEBC used the BVR kits at the March 4 polls but they faced technical hitches which led to failure of the kits re- sulting in manual identification of voters.
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