CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background of the Study
Electronic voting technology can include punched cards, optical scan voting systems and specialized voting kiosks (including self-contained direct-recording electronic voting systems, or DRE). It can also involve transmission of ballots and votes via telephones, private computer networks, or the Internet.
Electronic voting technology can speed the counting of ballots, reduce the cost of paying staff to count votes manually and can provide improved accessibility for disabled voters. However, there has been contention, especially in the United States, that electronic voting, especially DRE voting, could facilitate electoral fraud and may not be fully auditable. In addition, electronic voting has been criticized as unnecessary and expensive to introduce. Several countries have cancelled e-voting systems or decided against a large-scale rollout, notably the Netherlands and the United Kingdom (Kaplan,1954).
Bribery is another cancan worm that has eaten deep into the electoral system, a lot of people are involve in collecting gratification from the politicians thereby selling their conscience and their votes, it is due to the fact that the economic situation is not stable, there is a lot of people dying of hunger and starvation in our communities, this is common in the past election most people even go to the extent of tumb printing on ballot papers throughout the night when official voting as not started, this is a cardinal point of rigging an election using the INEC officials to supply voting materials to top politicians in a particular area, hence a resident electoral commissioner of INEC would visit a big name (Politician) in its territory of jurisdiction as a mark of loyalty to pave way for smooth flow of their corrupt tendency perpetuated at the pulls (Ugiagbe, 2011).
Toggeries is rampant in the aspect of our youths, today most politicians have tugs whom they use to disrupt election and steal ballot boxes from pulling stations, this are jobless youths who are trying to earn a living from dubious antecedents, these are the same youths who they use in carrying out their nefarious activities ranging from political rallies, political assassination etcetera. The masses are appealing to such youth to desist from their evil way and turn a new leaf otherwise nemesis will cash up with them, most of the time this same politicians use and dump such youth, it is high time for us to protect our votes and work ceaselessly to protect our nascent democracy. The country can be reduced or even eliminated this problem with the introduction of the e-voting system.
1.2 Statement of the Problems
Nigeria is a country with device ethnic group and corrugated different political motive ranging from the individual perspective to the political parties. What is really wrong with Nigeria electioneering process is the wheel to be on power at all cost not minding the interest of the masses, every political party that is on power wants to retain in power for their selfish interest, while doing this, they map out strategies that will enable them to rig the election either by crook or hook, this things are not mostly peculiar with the Nigeria system alone but is common due to the fact that most of the leaders even come out openly to declare their stands to fight with their last breath to win election (Igbuzor,2013). During the campaign of the past election the immediate past President Chief Olusegun Obasanjo once stated that “People’s Democratic Party (P.D.P.). Will surely produce the next President no matter the hurdles” with this, one will quickly deduce the fact that the election was a charade because INEC has been tailored along the line of P.D.P. candidate even if the party brings a weakling as their presidential candidate, in this regard the job of INEC is to deliver the favored candidate of the ruling party P.D.P. as the President of the country
It is also on record that most states won by P.D.P. are manned by P.D.P. governors and all the other parties lost their bids in such states, while in some states where we have other party, such party also won in their states, take for instance in Lagos State Alhaji Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu delivered its state to Action Congress (AC) while in Abia State Uzor Kalu delivered its state to Progressive Peoples Alliance (P.P.A.) in Imo state, P.D.P. did not win the state not because they don’t have the machinery, they intentionally lost the state because they are not in favour of the so called P.D.P candidate hence they drafted another member of the party (P.D.P.) to Action Congress (AC) in other to win the election, this said candidate will soon decamp to its original party Peoples Democratic Party (P.D.P.)
Political malpractice has taken a new dimension in the history of Nigeria, most of our religious leader are now praise singers of politicians, they have ignore their vows and responsibilities to the people by preaching the gospel which proffers rather to rain encomium on politician(s) who come to their congregation for thanks giving to God. Religions leaders should play their role of lordship over these politicians, they should chastised any dubious person that warrant such in other to cleans the society from bad eggs, charity they say begins at home it is the responsibilities of our religious leaders to call their congregation to other and imbibe in them good norms and morals.
1.3Aim and Objectives of the Study
The project aim and objectives that will be achieved after completion of this project are discussed in this subchapter. The aim and objectives are to resolve voting issue.
The major objectives of this study is aimed proposed at possible way forward and to provide a viable option that would ensure credible, fair and genuinely acceptable elections in the country.
Other objectives include:
- Voters have the opportunity to vote quickly and conveniently.
- The system can be used independent of the platform and device, be it on a smartphone, tablet or computer.
- People with disabilities can vote or take part in elections online without the help of a third party.
- Swiss citizens living both in Switzerland and abroad can participate in votes and elections irrespective of their place of residence.
- Clear user guidance prevents formal errors such as illegible answers, missing signatures, incorrectly completed forms or invalid lists in the voting and election process.
- Voters receive confirmation that their vote has been correctly cast and saved in the ballot box.
- Votes can be counted quickly and precisely.
- E-voting is secure: votes are only transmitted and saved in encrypted and anonymized form. Sophisticated algorithms prevent votes from being manipulated without being detected.