Voter Education Reduces Invalid Votes

Voter education is vital for increasing voter turnout and reducing the number of invalid votes in an election. Being part of civic education, voter education is highly essential for an underdeveloped country like Nepal, where the level of people’s consciousness is low, and the number of first-time voters is significant. 

With the March 5 elections to the House of Representatives (HoR) at hand, the time is ripe for the Election Commission of Nepal (ECN) to implement its voter education programme in a more effective manner. The election management body has developed necessary voter education materials in order to disseminate information on voting to electorates. In the country, there has been a practice of mobilising schoolteachers as volunteers and the employees deployed for elections to educate voters. Those volunteers teach voters about casting their ballot accurately.  

Invalid votes

The ECN allocates millions of rupees for the voter education programme during an election. Despite having invested such a huge amount of budget for voter education, every successive election seems to have recorded a lot of invalid votes. The poll management body’s records show that hundreds of thousands of votes, averaging more than 4 per cent of the total number of votes cast, were invalid in elections held between 1991 and 2022. 

In the federal parliament and provincial elections of 2022, as many as 5.06 per cent of the total number of votes cast were invalid. During that election, as much as Rs. 260.3 million budget was spent on the voter education scheme alone. Similarly, the number of invalid votes was much higher in the federal and local elections of 2017 as compared to the last ones.  This calls for prioritising voter education. 

Looking back to the first two parliamentary elections held in the country following the promulgation of the Constitution of Nepal, 2015, public engagement in the poll process appeared to have gone down to 61.5 per cent in 2022 from 69 per cent in 2017.  Voters’ turnout was 64 per cent in the local elections, while it stood at 72.5 per cent in the local polls of 2017. One of the main reasons for this scenario is the growing dissatisfaction among voters towards the political process. 

The government and the political parties need to be serious about addressing the public concerns so as to increase voter turnout. There is doubt that a more effective voter education is a tool to increase people’s participation in the electoral process. This type of education also enables citizens to make an informed decision while electing their representatives. So, an additional focus must be laid on conducting voter education at the grassroots level. The election system adopted by a country and the number of political parties participating in an election are also equally responsible for votes to be invalid. 

Various anomalies like corruption, a lack of accountability, nepotism, and favouritism seem to have created dissatisfaction and resentment among citizens. The fact that about 4 million people, especially youths, are outside the country is another factor behind the falling voter turnout. Such a large number of citizens have been deprived of their voting rights in the absence of necessary arrangements. However, this issue of ensuring voting rights to those working and studying abroad has been raised for quite a while. 

The ECN has set aside Rs. 250 million to promote voter education for the impending election. It runs voter education as an awareness campaign to impart necessary information on the election process to potential voters. Apart from deploying volunteers, the election body disseminates voter education materials through various mass media outlets. It also provides readers with information through social media platforms, online news portals, local radios, and television channels. 

Besides, it sends volunteers to every ward nationwide to give in-person directions on the right voting method so as to minimise the number of invalid votes. Such volunteers give instructions to those electorates who do not have easy access to online tools by using sample ballot papers. They also teach voters the method of proper marking and folding. This initiative is useful to those voters living in remote areas where there is no internet facility. The ENC also uses its webpages to circulate the correct information about the election. 

However, with the advancement of information and communication technology (ICT), there has been a rising trend among people, even in Nepal, to rampantly misuse social media platforms, violating the election code of conduct. Those media platforms are often found disseminating misinformation and disinformation about the election process, political parties and candidates. 

Taming such platforms has been quite challenging for the ECN and the government. To deal with such problems, the election management body has sought help from the Cyber Bureau of the Nepal Police and other relevant agencies. The political parties can also assist the ECN by deploying their volunteers dedicated to making voters aware of the correct voting method.     

Solution

Opting for an electronic voting system could be a sustainable solution to the existing issue of invalid votes and not-so-encouraging voter turnout. During the constituent assembly elections, Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) were used in some constituencies on a trial basis. The experiment was successful in lowering the number of invalid votes and increasing voters’ turnout. 

When EVMs are used in an election, voters also do not have to spend much time voting. Vote counting is also less time-consuming. So, it is necessary for the government to think of embracing the electronic voting system.

(The author is a former deputy executive editor of this daily.)