VOTER APATHY! Medicine for low for voter turn-up

By John Katanywa

Uganda has just concluded both presidential and parliamentary elections with the country registering the lowest voter turn up ever, according to results declared by the Electoral Commission.

This unprecedented civic withdrawal highlights a growing crisis of public confidence in presidential and parliamentary elections.

Official figures indicate that just over eleven million voters participated in the election out of slightly more than twenty-one million registered voters, translating into a turnout of just above fifty percent.

This means that more than ten million eligible voters did not cast a presidential and parliamentary ballot on polling day, a striking indicator of civic withdrawal.

The Uganda Human Rights Commission (UHRC) has expressed concern over the trend. Pauline Nansamba, the Director for Complaints, Investigations, and Legal Services, described the low turnout as troubling, noting that voting is a fundamental civic right that many Ugandans appear to be abandoning.

“As the Commission, we are going to analyse the data and investigate what made citizens shun their civic duty to vote. We shall later brief the media on our observations,” she said.

Political analyst and human rights defender Dr Livingstone Ssewanyana attributed the poor turnout partly to systemic failures on polling day, particularly the malfunctioning of biometric voter verification kits (BVVKs). He argued that the delays discouraged many voters from participating.

“We need explanations from the Electoral Commission on why the verification machines failed. This wasted valuable time, and many voters became frustrated and went back home, while others did not turn up at all after learning that polling had been delayed,” Ssewanyana said.

Decline voter turn up has been a trend in Uganda since 1996, when the first multi-party democracy elections were held in Uganda.

In 1996 voter turn up, was more than 70% of the registered voters but as per this year’s elections, the turn up was just above 50%

SOLUTION

The Declining turnout of eligible registered voters is a real phenomenon globally except in countries like Australia and Belgium where voting is mandatory.

The whys of this trend require a robust behavioral inquiry including context. Is Uganda’s 52% turnout the worst? Tunisia: 11.4% in the 2023 parliamentary elections, Algeria: 23% in the 2021 presidential election,   Nigeria: 27–29% in the 2023 presidential election, Switzerland: Around 45% turnout in the 2019 parliamentary elections (registered voters), the lowest among OECD countries,  Chile: Approximately 47-49%  parliamentary elections (e.g., 2021), following the shift from compulsory to voluntary voting in 2012, which caused a sharp drop, United States: Varies by election type; midterms often around 40-50%, while presidential elections reached 62-66% in 2020, Japan: Around 53-56% in recent parliamentary elections and   Portugal: Often below 50-60% in parliamentary and Presidential elections.

Near empty polling stations and weak legitimization of election winners are the results of low voter turnout

There are several reasons why people might abstain from voting, but you can stay one step ahead and reach your voters wherever they are worldwide. Voters have never lived and worked as flexibly and mobile as they do today

University students embarking on exchange semesters, and regular trips or longer stays abroad due to work are the norm nowadays.

It’s time for Uganda to make use of the digital opportunities online and adapt to online voting.

Uganda has to offer and facilitate participation for all her votes via online voting platforms if she wants to realize high voter turn up.

Increasing mobility in our society and technology should be embraced to broaden participation of voters in elections.

Reach more Voters with a Worldwide Online Election.

Uganda needs to get her voters to the digital polling station from anywhere in the world, take advantage of online voting and increase voter turnout.

With an easy authentication process or, for example, an electronic ID card, voters can log into the election website during business trips, vacation or a trip abroad and use their right to vote digitally.

Online voting is easy. It doesn’t matter if your voters happen to be on a sailing expedition in the Pacific, exploring Africa by bike or doing business in Shanghai. All you need is any device connected to the internet to cast your vote, which can increase voter turnout immediately.

This can also sway the technology obsessed Gen Zs to cast their votes, thus increasing the voter turn up.

We can as well go for mandatory voting or add vote incentives   to mitigate voter apathy

The writer is a political analyst.

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