ELECTIONS

Assesment of a Quality of Voters Registers in Serbia

INTRODUCTION

In order to acquire a complete image of the condition of electoral register in the Republic of Serbia, activists of the Centre for Free Elections and Democracy (CeSID) have, in December 2001, carried out a scope of activities aimed at collection and analysis of legal solutions and data, relevant for the work of municipal administrations competent for electoral register.

Using the network of regional offices and municipal co-ordinators, during the period between December 15th and December 25th, 2001 , CeSID activists surveyed 139 municipal services for maintenance of electoral register.

While conducting the survey, as a rule, CeSID activists were greeted with complaisance and co-operation by municipal officials. Unfortunately, in a couple of smaller municipalities, still locally ruled by remnants of the former regime, it was not possible to obtain any data whatsoever. The common explanation offered was that all the records are treated as official secret and, therefore, may be given only upon the official order issued by competent government agencies. In spite of the fact that CeSID activists indicated that the requested data were lawfully public, the attitude of the other side did not change at all.

In some municipal services, the data could not have been obtained even with the good will of the competent people, since the officers in charge of the electoral register were absent on justifiable leaves.

During the execution of this project, CeSID team managed to visit almost all the regional offices and met with most of the municipal co-ordinators.

CeSID representatives talked to the representatives of various state bodies, legally authorised to control and co-operate with municipal services in preparation of the electoral register (Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Serbia , Ministry of Justice and Local Self-management of the Republic of Serbia ).

Relevant legal regulation has been collected and systematised. The analysis of the aforementioned regulations, helped CeSID team of experts to prepare the Model Law on Election of Deputies and Delegates, particularly a part of it dealing with the electoral register.

Normative Framework, Some Inconsistencies

Each law regulating the elections, referendum and peoples initiatives in FRY partly deals with the issue of electoral registers. Implementation of these legal provisions is contained in number of bylaws such as Instructions on Method of Update of Electoral Registers, Decree on Categories of Registered Materials and Terms of Keeping, etc. The analysis of laws and bylaws of the Republic of Serbia and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia , stipulating the competence and methods for maintenance of electoral registers, indicates a substantial number of inconsistencies.

Electoral Register of Serbia - Unique System or Aggregate of Systems?

The Law on Election of National Deputies (The Official Gazette of the Republic of Serbia , 35/2000) stipulates the basic provisions for maintenance of electoral register. The electoral register is unique, permanent and general ( The Law on Election of National Deputies - LEND, Article 12, Paragraph 1 ) but there is no precise definition of the level at which it is unique (municipality, electoral unit, Republic); consequently, it is possible to conclude on the basis of definition of electoral register (LEND, Article 12) that the Law stipulates the uniqueness solely at municipal level. If the term unique electoral register is defined at municipal level, the municipal administration is responsible for its uniqueness.

Positive legislation understands the uniqueness as a body of electoral registers kept by municipalities ( The Instructions for Update of Electoral Registers , Article 3, The Official Gazette of the Republic of Serbia , 42/2000). Such wording clearly indicates that there is no central electoral register, as well as no central and unified evidence of voters, but only a simple aggregate of all municipal electoral registers.

As an confirmation of such attitude, we may use the fact that in republican elections held in December 2000, the Republican Electoral Commission presented to the public a "unique" electoral register of the Republic of Serbia stored on two compact disks that, according to the information received from the Ministry of Internal Affairs, was nothing else but the simple compilation of 161 municipal electoral registers. It is worth mentioning that this was the first attempt to set up the central evidence of voters and to process by electronic means the voters related data from 17 municipalities where the electoral registers are still being maintained manually.

Organisation of Activities of Services for Maintenance of Electoral Registers

The electoral register is being maintained by the municipal administration as the entrusted duty (LEND, Article 12 Para.1). Beside the stipulation providing that maintenance of evidence of voters is to be done by automated data processing, although there are some exceptions to this provision, there is no prescribed method for communication between the competent bodies (Ministry of Internal Affairs, registrar services, courts, social workers and other municipal services) obliged by the law to provide relevant information to the municipal service for maintenance of the electoral register.

In the city of Belgrade , there is a special administrative service dealing with the electoral register - Secretariat for Administration of the City of Belgrade - Department for Electoral Register. Although the original competence of municipalities has been preserved, the city service performs permanent control of updating the electoral register and forms the database uniquely for 16 municipalities in co-operation with the City Institute for Information Technology and Statistics . Even though the voters database is being maintained uniquely, there is no possibility to make any changes whatsoever in the electoral register at the city level. Once the need is noted for inscription, deletion or alteration of the voters' data, the city service is authorised to inform the competent municipal service about the necessity to make changes in the electoral register, thus fulfilling its competence.

Individualisation of Voters

The data kept in the electoral register are: number, personal name, sex, date of birth, place of residence (street and number, village, hamlet, community) and remark (LEND, Article 15, Paragraph 2). Considering the fact that the unique citizens registration number is not a compulsory entry in the electoral register, technically it is very difficult, if not impossible, to preserve the principle of uniqueness of the electoral register as well as the principle of one voter being registered only in one electoral register.

Survey Results

Bodies Competent for Maintenance of Electoral Registers

Forming of the electoral register is the competence of municipal administration, which is entrusted with this task as duty of the state administration. By adoption of decision on organisational structure, the local administration bodies determine the number of employees, number of working hours and other matters relevant for the maintenance of the electoral register. Survey results have indicated that in more than 10% of municipalities in Serbia , there is no clerk working full time on the maintenance of the electoral register. In these municipalities, the electoral register is being maintained, as a rule, within the registrar services. Departments for general administrative affairs most often appear being the competent bodies. Beside the maintenance of he electoral register, these services are often responsible for urbanism, legal-property and communal affairs, thus the clerks in charge of the electoral register often perform some other tasks

In 55% of the surveyed municipalities, one full time employee maintains the electoral register, whereas in other municipalities, two, up to five employees are doing this job. Vocational structure of employees is very favourable. Vocational training prescribed for these positions by respective bylaw is most common. Service managers are University graduates. In larger urban communities, where greater number of employees is engaged in this type of work, as a rule, they have some kind of degree. However, the survey indicated that a common denominator for majority of employees is a poor knowledge of information technology.

Technical Aspects of Maintenance of Electoral Registers

Although the positive legislation provides for automated data processing ( LEND , Article 12), bylaw permits the possibilities for manual maintenance of electoral record ( Instructions for Update of Electoral Registers, Article 9). The up-to-date maintenance of the electoral registers requires extremely good support of information technology.

Results of the survey show that some 10% of municipalities still maintain the electoral register manually. Since such method is extremely inefficient, we estimate that the electoral register in those municipalities is presently updated at November 2001 level. Services that implemented automated data processing are using, as an average, one computer already in use between 4 and 11 years. Beside obsoleteness, irregular servicing and lack of appropriate hardware, the greatest problem is lack and incompatibility of software. There is no unique software for maintenance of the electoral register, although, according to the officials of the municipal service for maintenance of the electoral register in Municipality of Valjevo , some experimental software, Oracle-Pupin, is being already tested. If it proves being successful, it will be applied in other municipalities too. CeSID co-ordinators registered the existence of at least 90 software packages being used, most of them designed by different manufacturers. Incompatibility of software packages complicates the communication between municipal services and other bodies even in situations when there is a possibility for electronic exchange of data.

Updating Data on Voters (Co-operation of Competent Services)

Updating of electoral registers comprises inscription, alteration, correction and amendment of data entered in the electoral register, as well as deletion of data from the electoral register (The Instructions for Update of Electoral Registers , Article 1).

In practice, these operations are being done by means of collecting the data from competent government bodies and services and comparing them with the data entered into the existing evidence of voters, rarely upon the initiative of individuals submitting the appropriate documents.

The Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Serbia , based on provisions of the Law on Unique Citizens Registration Number and the Law on Registration of Residence and Sojourn, forms the register of citizens of the Republic of Serbia . On a regular basis, practically meaning two or three times a week, up to once a month, local secretariats of the Ministry of Internal Affairs communicate the data to the service for maintenance of the electoral register. This communication is mainly done by correspondence, while electronic submission of data is still scarce. Only some 18% of municipal services communicate with the Ministry of Internal Affairs by means of modem or exchange of floppy disks. The Law stipulates the obligation of every person, changing the residence, to report this change, within certain period of time, to the competent secretariat of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. According to the officials of this Ministry, this obligation is rarely being observed in practice, and the consequence is incompleteness and unreliability of such evidence.

The situation of registries is somehow similar. The registries of births, being the source of data for inscription into the evidence of voters, are most often the reliable source of information. The registries of deaths, however, only offer a partly reliable information relevant for deletion of data from the electoral register. The fact of death of a person is entered into the registry of deaths in the municipality in which the death occurs. When person dies in the municipality of residence, the respective data has to be deleted from the electoral register within the term of one week (35% of services), one month (60% of services) or more than one month (5% of services). However, if person dies on the territory of some other municipality, the situation appears to be more complex. Only 39% of municipal services surveyed demand this information from other municipal services, hospitals, spas etc. Once the information is obtained, the voter's data is deleted within the term of one to five months. One CeSID co-ordinator came across an interesting example, in the service for maintenance of the electoral register of the City of Belgrade . In the middle of 2000, when a complete list of voters was made for the City of Belgrade (territory of 16 city municipalities), it indicated the existence of several hundred active voters of 100 or more years of age. Unfortunately, those were not the elderly citizens of Belgrade , but persons who died at some other place. Upon the completion of data gathering from major municipal administrations in Serbia and Montenegro , almost ten thousand interventions were made in the electoral register of the City of Belgrade .

The body responsible for maintenance of the electoral register is obliged, whenever needed, to immediate control of the data entered in the electoral register ( The Instructions for Update of Electoral Registers , Article 7). The obvious fact that the electoral register is not updated should subsequently require the immediate control of data in the field. Responding to the question how often does such control take place on the territory of municipality, the replies stated: at least once a week (19%), once a month (35%), never (approximately 30%). Altogether, about 55% of municipal services are active in the field, but apparently this activity is left to the individual initiative of employees maintaining the electoral register.

Keeping, Storing and Control of Electoral Registers

Since the Law prescribes permanent keeping of regulations, electoral registers and other materials relevant for evidence of voters, CeSID co-ordinators have gathered the information on number of voters registered for the previous federal and republican elections. In 8% of municipal services there were no data on current number of voters registered in the electoral register; 21% of municipal services managed to provide only this number, while 36% of municipal services had the information originating from the elections held in 2000. Only some 35% of municipal services for maintenance of electoral registers were able to provide a complete reply to the question: What is the number of voters who have been registered in the electoral register of your municipality since 1996? In response to this question, it was also necessary to state the number of voters registered in the electoral register upon the court decision, but 31% of municipal services had no knowledge about such information.

Control of updating of the electoral register is the competence of the Ministry of Justice and Local Self-government. The control is being done once or twice a year in all municipalities in the Republic. According to the authorities, the problems are numerous. Among the most important are poor co-ordination of activities between the state bodies and services and the service maintaining the electoral register as well as the non-existence of unique software. The indistinct legal provisions create confusion and unequal practice in maintenance of the electoral register.

Electoral register is maintained in accordance with the general provisions of the Law on General Administrative Process, which means that, before each inscription, deletion or alteration of data, a respective decision has to be made ( LEND, Article 17, Paragraph 2). Administrative inspectors of the Ministry claim that in some municipalities, the software in use permits only the possibility to make change in the electoral register first, and to issue the respective decision afterwards, which directly contravenes with the provisions stipulated by the Law.

CeSID Control of Updating of Electoral Register

It is encouraging that CeSID co-ordinators managed to check their own respective data in the electoral register, most often in less than 3 minutes. However, five co-ordinators were not entered in electoral register, whereas the respective data for one co-ordinator were not completely correct (4.3% of the total number). CeSID co-ordinators appreciated the politeness and complaisance of the officers competent for maintenance of the electoral register with an average 4.73 points (minimum: 1 point, maximum: 5 points).

Conclusions

Based on the analysis of the electoral register in Serbia , we may conclude the following:

• The principle of uniqueness of the electoral register, guaranteed by the Law (LEND, Article 12, Paragraph 1) has not been elaborated neither by positive legislation nor in practice.
• There is no special Service for maintenance of the electoral register at republican level.
• There is no organisational and procedural conformity of services for maintenance of the electoral registers at municipal level.
• In some municipalities, computers are still not used for maintenance of the electoral registers.
• Computer equipment in use is obsolete.
• There is no unique software for maintenance of the electoral registers.
• There is no uniformity in communication between the municipal services competent for maintenance of electoral registers and the state bodies and organisations, the services are prescribed to communicate with.

Recommendations

• It is necessary to define precisely the uniqueness of the electoral register on territory of the Republic, territory of the City of Belgrade and territories of municipalities and towns.
• It is necessary to set up a special service competent for maintenance of the electoral register, as an auxiliary body of the Republican Electoral Commission.
• It is necessary to define clearly the procedures conformed with the relevant laws and to define all processes for maintenance of the electoral registers.
• It is necessary to provide the competent services with suitable computer equipment and to train the employees in elementary, general use of computers and standard office software.
• It is necessary to introduce clear standards for implementation of information and communication technologies in accordance with proper procedure for maintenance of the electoral registers, from municipal to republican level.
• It is necessary to train personnel to follow the proper procedure for maintenance of the electoral register and to use the appropriate software.

Ivan Nikolic
Project Coordinator

Belgrade,
February 11, 2002