Presently, in most countries, the use of technology is part of the electoral system, supplementing the human element on quantitative and qualitative bits on the electoral law. 

In Kenya specifically, this shift was largely informed after the 2007-2008 elections that saw many lose their lives and some displaced because of electoral dispute.

Since then, technology has been used in the 2012 Constitution of Kenya referendum and in the 2013 and 2017 general elections. 

The three-piece technology included the Biometric Voter Registration, Electronic Voter Identification, and an electronic Results Transmission System. 

However, even with the technology, there has been issues in implementation.  Now, a bigger issue is arising that experts are worried about: how data is used and stored.  

“Data privacy is a big concern now that we are operating in a digital space where we are conducting a public process­— an election.

There is hacking and interferences, but the biggest question has not been whether we have laws in place or a regulatory framework.

It  has been, do we adhere to that legal framework?” says Mulle Musau, national coordinator, Elections Observation Group. 

He was speaking at the Kenya Internet Governance Forum by KICTANet, a multi-stakeholder Think Tank in ICT policy and regulation.

Amongst many topics discussed in the webinar, elections and technology was one of them, with experts looking at the way forward in this coming elections. 

“The question is how do we address the breaches in light of the fact that there is impunity in the country and that authorities are not complying with laws.

The best way to go about it is having a very active advocacy campaign carried out by all stakeholders and a robust public education so that people know their rights in terms of what needs to go out there and what needs not to,” continues Mulle. 

Bernard Mugendi, digital rights lead at the Kenya Human Rights Commission, observes the role of stakeholders in ensuring data safety during the electoral process. 

“They should prioritise this in three sections. First there should be transparency in the electoral process.

Two, technology should reinforce trust in elections and democratic process and not undermine it.

Three, stakeholders have a key role to ensure it is protecting voters’ data,” he says.

Fake news

Bernard adds that in the evolution of technology in electoral process, civil societies and observers have a duty to update people on the election observation technologies used, which includes data and technology aspects.

 “In transparency, let us also look at the election management bodies in this case IEBC.

Transparency to me begins from procurement, and sadly the whole process has been infused with so much secrecy, but ideally for credible elections, the body needs to make this transparent to increase credibility from procuring the biometric election kits, registration of voters all the way to the election day,” Bernard notes. 

There is also the issue of misinformation on the internet, which Bernard feels should be addressed. 

“How do the social media platforms ensure their platforms are not used to spread fake news on elections?” he asks. 

Kenya has recently designated the office of data protection. For the first time, this office will come up with guidelines during an election period in as far as data protection is concerned. 

“Elections is all about the people, and however the technology is, it must be deciphered in a manner that the mwananchi can understand.

That’s why technology should never be a difficult thing and all the system shouldn’t be complicated.

This infuses a level of public confidence. From 2017 elections, the issue we picked up was to build public trust and for that we need a robust public engagement process.

IEBC must work for the people and must ensure whatever activities it is undertaking, including other election management bodies, must work for the people,” says Mulle.

 Mulle adds that societies and other stakeholders with knowledge on data protection and technology should assist the public understand the process of elections. 

Fiona Asonga, CEO of Technology Service Providers Kenya, sees the issue on data protection as more of a value system rather than technology. 

“It is the value systems we have in our society and business environment that will transfer to our technological platforms.

We take our value system and start putting it into the technological framework. And that begins to defeat the purpose of what technology is to deliver,” she notes. 

In past elections, several technological problems arose. For instance, laptops and cellphones  ran out of charge, some rural stations had no power.

Poll workers were poorly trained on how to employ the software, some forgetting PINs.

The servers too were unable to handle the volume of data being uploaded leading to breakdown and error in results. 

“Kenya’s Integrated Election Management Systems should have certain facets focusing on the different stages and have separate systems.

In the past, we’ve had a manual voting system, the counting or tallying can be manual or digital, but most times, when we have a manual voting you’ll have a manual tallying of the votes.

So here is where questions are raised as to what extent we are going to have technology when most processes are manual.

What modules are they taking on to automate the electoral process and what will be manual,” she says in conclusion.