Election officials in Tanzania have moved to address concern over the adoption of biometric voter registration (BVR) for the 2015 general elections, emphasising it will be used only for registration and not for voting itself.
HumanIPO reported last month Tanzania would become the latest country after Ghana and Kenya to adopt the system.
In the face of public concern following the failure of the BVR systems in Kenya in March, Hamid Mahmoud Hamid, National Electoral Commission (NEC) vice chairman, said the BVR kits would not be used for the actual vote.
The NEC said voting rights would be observed to the letter and all entitled to vote would be able to exercise their right.
“It is true that there are some voters who are left out, but this can be solved when we are empowered to have representatives at the grassroots level and when the NEC legislation is amended to that effect,” said NEC commissioner Amoni Chaligha.
Kenya implemented an electronic system ahead of its election last month, but the BVR kits ended up mired in controversy as a system collapse delayed the counting of votes, with regional election officials told to physically deliver counts to Nairobi.
The Kenyan Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) was forced to admit technical glitches, and asked returning officers to travel to the counting centre in Nairobi to manually transmit the results of constituency voting.
BVR kits use fingerprints and facial scans to identify registered voters. The NEC is set to float tenders for the acquisition of the necessary systems and invite donors to fund the procurement.
Sisti Cariah, NEC deputy secretary, said the system can store around 12 features but will be used to store only three data points to confirm voters, namely fingerprints, facial images and signatures.
