CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1
Background
of the Study.
Elections
form a critical process in democratic systems and application of
information technologies to their management is a great milestone towards
realizing effectiveness and efficiency not only in the results of the
election process itself but also in the financial implications that come up
with the process.
One basic feature of student’s
unionism is the right to be able to choose their leaders by themselves
through the processes of elections. And one basic feature of democracy that
cuts across all divides of people is the act of election. Democracy thus
encourages individual freedom according to the rule of law, so that people can
behave and express themselves as they choose. This not only gives people the
chance to choose their leaders, but also air their views on issues
affecting their well–being. For a democratic government, public opinion is
the most important determinant to establish a government and voting is the
process through which people display their opinion and help to setup a
democratic government. So the voting system should be reliable, accurate
and above all must be transparent.
In the paper or manual voting
system, a voter usually goes to the voting stations known as voting units.
After direct person-person verification with some IDs, the voter is allowed
to vote. The voter is then given a ballot paper which allows a single vote.
Once the ballot paper is used, it cannot be reused. However, this ballot
paper must also be anonymous as voters do not need to display their
identity. I.e. to say, that the ballot paper must identify the voter as
being permitted to vote, but not reveal their actual identity. Traditional
polling methods trust a lot of parties during the election.
The various drawbacks of a traditional
electioneering system are mainly collusion between the electronic officials
and contestants, the queuing time, delayed results, overworked tallying
officials and the undeniable fact of human errors. The existing voting
system did not provide reliable statistics on voting history in the college
and thus campaigners lacked the ground to apply scientific voter
forecasting methods resolving to trial and error methodologies which are
error prone and inconsistent.
Reinforcing a one voter one vote policy is difficult
in such a situation and malpractices as rigging are not uncommon in manual
voting system. It is impossible to completely rule out the need for
technology and electronic voting, with the growing number of eligible
voters and manual ballot papers involved. It was very easy or manageable in
the past because, the institution had few numbers of students (eligible
voters). But now the numbers of students have increased and have a high
possibility of increasing higher, in the nearest future. It was manageable
when we had just the NCE program and few courses on the degree program. But
as real as it is now, the institution is growing beyond bounds and the
manual system of voting which in so many previous Students’ union
government (SUG) elections had caused more than a lot of chaos. The
institution, Federal college of education (technical) Omoku, having adopted
information technology in various fields of her dealings with students, the
student union government should also adopt a new system of voting which is
the electronic voting (E-voting) system.
Let’s consider the
following points on the existing voting system in the student union
government (SUG) of Federal College of Education Omoku:
a.
The system that exists
currently in Federal college of education (Technical) Omoku student Union
Government, is totally paper based and manual, that takes lots of time and
the government has to bear the financial expenses for this purpose.
b.
The voters are registered just
before the poll so the election commission gets some time in hand for
making all the necessary arrangements with in this short period of time.
They just add the new voters with the previous voters so that the people
who are deceased by this time may be considered as the existing voter if the
election committee members are not informed. So people may not see the
voter’s list as reliable because it contains numerous fake voters.
c.
Again the authority itself may
be corrupted and can allow some fake voters to participate. If any voter
stays outside the school premises or misses the registration processes
somehow due to prior obligations or unavoidable circumstances, he or she
wouldn’t be considered as a voter.
d.
Sometimes people ruin their
votes by stamping on two or more signs mistakenly. This is also a drawback
of paper based voting system.
e.
While casting the votes the
acting officers present in the centers marks a voter with a black ink on
his or her nail but it is removable. So there is a high chance of casting
illegal votes. (I.e. voting more than one time)
All these problems together inspired
the thought of developing a new system that will reduce corruption,
increase accuracy and fast paced. The concept of electronic voting system
comes from this necessity.
Lets also consider
some advantages of the electronic voting (E-voting) system, been the
proposed system if implemented.
a.
Online voting (E-voting)
systems’ efforts will be geared towards the minimization, if not the total
elimination, of the problems associated with manual systems of elections. A
number of mechanisms will be introduced to ensure that time and other resources
are efficiently used.
b.
Although the initial cost of
developing the online voting systems would be high, the long run effects
would be that election costs would drastically reduce.
c.
Online voting (E-voting)
systems would make obsolete the need for ballot boxes and papers, because
the system would simulate these. This would mean that printing costs would
be reduced by a considerable amount.
d.
Online voting (E-voting)
systems usually tally results as and when votes are cast. This also means
that vote counting, which takes a lot of time when done manually, would be
eliminated. At the click of a button, results of an election would be displayed.
These and many more are the possible
advantages the student union government of federal college of education
(technical) Omoku, will get if the proposed online voting system is
accepted and implemented.
1.2
Statement
of the Problem:
Using the decade old election system to collect
votes from the students is no longer considered efficient due to the
various reoccurring errors. The traditional/manual voting system employed
in the management of electioneering procedures at the college were not
foolproof and were prone to inconsistencies, election malpractices and
untimely delivery of results leading to questions about the credibility and
validity of the results the returning election officer announces. Much
expense was incurred in the production, transportation, storage and
destruction of the ballot papers and ballot boxes. So time has come for the
paper based primordial voting system which has already proven itself an
inefficient and slow procedure to be changed to something more innovative
and stress free. Most voters
(Students) are busy with their various academic works and Most of the voters
(Students) are living far away from the school environments/campus, been
the main voting centre, some voter’s don't like to wait in queues thus due
to these reasons, voters don't visit the pooling booth and Percentage of
vote is decreasing.
These days voting system is somehow
complicated and time consuming, i.e. this process that involves; voters
manually going to a voting centre and shows voter card (Id) to the voting
officer. This voting card will be used for authentication during the actual
voting process at the voting point. Where they believe that their names are
made available and after authentication with this, a voters’ list will be
generated for each constituency. The name of such voter will be searched in
the list and each voter will then have to go to a polling station and cast
their vote by placing their thumb to print against the name or symbol
(Logo) of individual or aspirants of their choice. In Federal college of
education (Technical) Omoku, an indelible ink mark is made on the voter’s
right index finger, to show that this person has already voted and so the
voter cannot vote again. This is an all time consuming process. Also a
large man power is needed for checking voter id, voter list and marking the
finger and at each polling station. So election commission has to pay the
cost for the required man power.
After much studies on various past
SUG elections of the federal college of education (technical) Omoku, and
their failures in accuracy, security, fairness, adequacies etc. This study
therefore laid emphasis on the design of online voting (E-Voting) system
for federal college of education (technical) Omoku. Student’s union
government elections.
1.3
Purpose
of the Study
The aim of this project is to design an online
voting (E-voting) system for federal college of education (Technical)
Omoku, student union government elections. This will help the
electioneering committee of the Student Union Government achieve the
following:
a.
To conduct a free and fair election using
electronic machines.
b.
To replace the current inefficient manual system of
voting in the college.
c.
To ensure credibility in elections by preventing
double voting.
d.
To also help the student union government reduce
the huge expenses incurred from conducting elections.
1.4
Significance
of the Study.
In view of the rapid development of computer
technology in virtually all fields of operation in federal college of
education (Technical) Omoku and its use in relation to information
management, it has become important to look into the development of
electronic voters registration system to enable the student’s union
government to achieve the following;
(a)
Conduct free and fair election.
(b) Safeguard
data and information in the system.
(c) Reduce workload in the process of conducting election.
(d) Keep
accurate record of votes.
1.5
Scope
of the Study.
The research work is designed to enable Electoral
Commission of the Student Union Government of the Federal college of
education (Technical) Omoku, to use electronic device to capture voters’
information. The design will cover some security issues and authentications.
This research covered five (5)
schools in federal college of education (Technical) Omoku, Rivers State
they include;
i.
School of primary education
studies,
ii.
School of business education
iii.
School of vocational education
iv.
School of secondary education
(Science)
v.
School of technical education.
1.6
Limitation
of the Study
During the design of this project
work, Time factor was the greatest barrier to the successful completion of
this exercise since it had to be done within the semester.
The study was limited to federal
college of education (Technical) Omoku.
1.7
Research
Questions:
In order to arrive at the stated
objectives of this study, the researcher attempted to provide answers to
the following questions:
a.
What importance is Online
voting (E-voting) system to the student union government elections of
federal college of education (technical) Omoku?
b.
How can online voting
(E-voting) system solve the various inadequacies created by the current
voting system (Manual voting system) of the student union government
elections of federal college of education (technical) Omoku?
c.
What level of assurance is
given to the student union government of federal college of education
(technical) Omoku, that the proposed system (Online voting system) will be better
and more efficient than the current system (manual voting system)?
d.
What are the major predictors
of adopting online voting (E-voting) system in the student union government
elections of federal college of education (technical) Omoku?
1.8
Organization
of Work
The study is structured into five
chapters. The first chapter generally introduced the study. The second chapter
reviewed relevant literatures which consists brief history of online
voting. The third chapter consists of research methodology, under this
chapter we talked about research design, area of study, population of the
study and sample, data collection techniques, procedure for data analysis
etc. The fourth chapter discussed about the data presentation and empirical
analysis. The purpose of this chapter is to analyze the data obtained
through questionnaires from the sample and used them to compute answers to
the research. Then, we shall accept or reject the hypotheses based on
stated acceptance and rejection rules at specific level of significance as
well as the discussion of the findings about entrepreneurship education and
recommendation of further studies. Finally the conclusion segment of the
work closes the study.
1.9
Definition
of Terms.
Student’s Union Government:
This
is a body, made of individuals (students) with the power to make and
execute laws to control the students in a given institution. They are
groups of people who hold monopoly on the legitimate use of force in a
given institution.
Election: this
is a process of choosing a leader, members of parliament, councilors or
other representatives by popular vote.
Voting: This
is an act or the process through which people display their opinion and
help to setup a democratic government.
Online Voting System: Also known as e-voting is a term encompassing several
different types of voting embracing both electronic means of counting
votes. Electronic voting technology can include punched cards, optical scan
voting systems and specialized voting kiosks (including self-contained
direct-recording electronic voting systems or DRE)
Campus: The grounds and buildings
of a university or college.
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