Election process (was re: [rpd] AFRINIC Board Elections - 2014: Call for Nominations)

[McTim]

Hi Seun,


As a former Member of the AFRINIC Election Review Committee and former
chair of the
NomCom/Election Committee, let me offer my perspective inline below:


On Thu, May 8, 2014 at 3:05 AM, Seun Ojedeji <seun.ojedeji at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hello Mr Chair,
>
> Thanks for this information, good to see that all the positions has a
> minimum contestant of 3 which is quite healthy for the entire process. I can
> see familiar names (with some surprises), i guess that is the fun part of an
> election :) and wish everyone all the best as they contest.
>
> I have observed with great concern that it seem some of the comments made
> during the last AGM in relation to the election process may not have been
> taken into consideration by nomcom. At least i remember the few ones i made
> (which i think some other people echoed):
>
> - The electronic voting is starting before getting the opportunity to hear
> from the contestants. In view of this, does it mean either of the following
> will happen:
> 1. There will be no time when the contestant will speak to the community
> (i.e the only information posted on the website is what will be used for
> both at online and f2f voting)
> 2. The speech of the contestants will be uploaded before the electronic
> voting starts and further speaking opportunity awarded to contestants
> present at f2f

I imagine that election video will be made available as they are sent
by the candidates.

>
> - The closing date for the online voting has been set to end before f2f; as
> mentioned in the last AGM why does the online voting have to close earlier
> than the f2f voting?


There are several reasons for this.

1. to give the staff time to tabulate e-votes before election itself.

2. to exclude those who have e-voted from the f2f voting, otherwise
there is an opportunity to vote more than once.

 since its the same election one means of voting should
> not be shut down before the other. Is it that there are no enough resources
> to make the online voting platform run concurrently?


see above, there is no alternative if we want to ensure that folks can
only vote once.


> One of the other point mentioned was that closing the online voting should
> be an event and the total number of votes from the online voting system
> should be made known to the community concurrently. That is why its
> important to close the online voting same time with the f2f.


To do so would invalidate the election process IMHO.  If the results
of online voting
were known, it could/would have an effect on the f2f voting.   It is
one election with 2 different voting methods.

Releasing preliminary results will almost certainly skew the end result.


>
> I like to thank you and your team for all the efforts towards ensuring a
> credible election.


+1  and good luck to all candidates.

I agree with Owen, we don't need term limits.


-- 
Cheers,

McTim
"A name indicates what we seek. An address indicates where it is. A
route indicates how we get there."  Jon Postel