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

[McTim]

On Thu, May 8, 2014 at 8:26 AM, Seun Ojedeji <seun.ojedeji at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hello Tim,
> On Thu, May 8, 2014 at 1:56 PM, McTim <dogwallah at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> 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:
>>
>
> Thanks for your response, kindly find mine inset:
>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> > - 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.
>>
> Based on this i imagine both options 1 and 2 will happen. Will appreciate if
> current nomcom could kindly confirm this?
>
>>
>> >
>> > - 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.
>>
> Thanks for those vital points, while i will like to know the other "several
> reasons" i will make my comments on the 2 important ones you've mentioned
> above:
>
> - For those 2 points above to be a reason means that there is definitely
> some further development that needs to be done on the online voting
> platform. The platform should be able to filter out already voted members
> from those who haven’t


I believe this work has already been done, and therefore only members in good
standing who have NOT voted electronically may vote f2f.

If you have both running concurrently, then you eliminate this ability
to exclude those
who have already voted.


>
> - Even if the current voting platform does not have such feature, it should
> not take more than few min to manually filter out members who have not voted
> using the online platform(especially if list of members in good standing is
> readily available)
>
> Once the filtering is clear, then its easy for the rest of the members
> present at the f2f to either chose to vote online(during f2f) or vote by
> paper ballot. Anyone who choose paper ballot will automatically not be
> enabled to vote online. That way there won't be double voting possibilities
> and those who are still remote up till AGM can still cast their vote
> remotely during and after the realtime speeches of the candidates.


I see the advantage in this of course, but it does leave open the
possibility that 2 people,
working in concert can at least attempt to double vote.  One person
could even do it with the right timing.


>
>>
>>  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?


I don't think it is a question of resources, but rather of election integrity.

>>
>> see above, there is no alternative if we want to ensure that folks can
>> only vote once.
>
>
> kindly see my comments above on how i think it can be done and let me know
> what part of the process i may have missed.
>>
>>
>>
>> > 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.
>>
> Nope i am not saying release preliminary results, i am saying release the
> results of the online voting and f2f concurrently! This will remove possible
> "mindset" that some may be privileged to know the online voting results
> prior to that of f2f



If I recall correctly, there is only one person (the CEO) who is able
to obtain the results
of the e-vote and he does this just before the f2f vote.

The NomCom is always looking for volunteers. I encourage all to raise
their hands next time for
this necessary but often thankless task.

@Adam, I believe the By-Laws call for a paper ballot, but those could
be changed by the BoD as needed.


-- 
Cheers,

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