Ever since the word was coined millennia ago by the ancient Greek, Democracy has become a cornerstone for the way political ruling is carried out today. The marvellous concept of vesting the power in the people has become a principle by which many of today’s governments are now operating or for the most part claiming to do so. Accordingly, for this concept to be executed there needs to be a free electoral system, our democracy therefore ultimately relies on elections.
Throughout the years, history has shown that running a perfect election has become an impracticable idea. Elections if anything have been far from perfect in the way they have been executed. An observable fact whose occurrence can be attributed to the nature of the elections themselves. With the future of thousands or millions of people hanging in the balance, individuals over the ages have always tried to do whatever they could to have their say reign as supreme without mentioning the countless power corrupt leaders who have in their turn gone to the extremes of cheating elections in order to preserve their sovereignty.
This has consequently made the concept of true democracy somewhat questionable up to a certain extent. With so many incidents of missing elections votes , or fraud election results, the goal to true democracy worldwide still seems somewhat unattainable. Fortunately for us the advances in technology have been greater than our shortcomings in establishing governments for the people by the people. Technology once again has come to the rescue by giving us the potential to carry out elections in a truly outstanding manner.
With the use of technology I do not mean the conventional e-voting method that has been carried out for a while. A sophisticated yet unsuccessful alternative due to its unreliability to internet threats such as hackers and its open exposure to fraud. There is a new, better and simpler means that has been developed by researchers aiming to carry out elections differently. All it takes is a scanner, encrypted paper (the ballot form) and computers. Items that seem to be unremarkable in the sense of technology but when put together form the ideal ingredients to carrying out a perfect elections.
The notion behind this revolutionary idea is that elections despite their principle of secrecy, still need to be verifiable. A voter still needs to be able to go back and check if their vote has been counted. If people have the right and the means to go back and certify their vote then it opens a whole new window to transparency and truth.
The ironic fact of enabling verification while still maintaining secrecy is a puzzle and mystery that is cracked by the use of technology. The ballot form onto which the voter casts his vote is divided in two with one half containing the candidate list and the other the corresponding area for marking a choice. The candidate list is arranged in a different order on each ballot form. During the procedure when a voter finishes casting his vote he tears the paper in half and shreds the candidate list. This basically means that since the candidate list has been shredded there are no names to read but only choices left on the other half and due to the random order of the candidate list after tearing the paper no one will bother memorising the order of the candidates so that he can tell which one you picked. The secret however lies in the ballot form since it is an encrypted paper with a barcode on it. This means that the computer will be able to read and understand your vote.
The best thing about this procedure is that you get to take your vote home but leave it for counting by scanning your paper. The computer remains with a scanned photo of your ballot form and it is available online for verification. When one wishes to check for their vote they simply do so by comparing their ballot form with the digital image that is online.
The beauty about this whole procedure is the way it preserves the secrecy of your vote while at the same time respecting the fundamentals of transparency and verifiability. The voting officials won’t be able to check your vote, neither will the government or anybody else for that matter. The mystery behind your vote lies in your own confidentiality and the complicated encryption on your ballot form. No one can break in and cast away your vote because then it will go missing and since you still have the ballot form the lost vote can be verified for. Most importantly no one can change your vote because the digital image online won’t match your ballot form. To add on top of that any certified institution be it the news media , international observers or any ordinary person will have the capacity to download all the voting data and count it for themselves checking if all the votes have been counted correctly or if the announced result is truly the right one. This further reinforces the great lucidity that is trademark to this extraordinary way of voting.
This election magic is truly wonderful in all its simplicity. It truly paves way to freedom, truth and democracy. It is practical, simple and a great tool to establishing a real election by the people for the people.
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