24157: Tribble (reply) 24050: Election costs, etc... (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Conrad Tribble <tribblehome@mac.com>

This year's elections are being organized by the Conseil Electoral
Provisoire (CEP) with technical assistance primarily from MINUSTAH and
the OAS.   IFES was active in past elections in Haiti but is not
involved in organizing this one.  The CEP is finalizing the electoral
decree and calendar this month which will outline how the elections are
to be carried out, following consultations with political parties,
civil society representatives, and the government.  The decision was
made early on in the process that using electronic voting systems was
not feasible for Haiti, so voting will be done with traditional
methods.  That said, most players support the CEP's intent to provide
digital, permanent voter registration cards (with identifying info
built in) that will serve not only for voting but as broader civil ID
cards for a host of government functions.   The CEP budget, which will
be covered in (small) part by the government and in large part by
contributions from international donors, will amount to somewhere
between $45-50 million.  This will cover the costs of establishing or
renovating the departmental and communal-level electoral councils and
voting centers (most of which have deteriorated since the last election
for want of upkeep), security for those facilities (guards, etc.),
registration and voting materials (eg printing 4 million ballots), the
registration process itself, salaries for election officials and poll
workers, voter education, and all the logistics you can imagine are
needed (cars, phones, paper, etc.).  It is not cheap, of course, but
consider the alternative...

Conrad