Integrity of 2024 elections can’t be jeopardised — EC
The Electoral Commission (EC) has assured that a Biometric Verification Device (BVD) cannot jeopardise the integrity of the 2024 elections.
“It does not affect the integrity of an election. It is nothing more than an off-the-shelf device and cannot be used to compromise an election, without the necessary technical and security protocols,” a statement signed by the Deputy Chairman of the EC in charge of Operations, Samuel Tettey, said.
It follows the arrest of a man at Nsawam last Friday for the possession of a Biometric Verification Device (BVD).
It said the EC would collaborate with the Ghana Police Service to bring the matter to its logical conclusion.
The statement, therefore, urged the Ghana Police Service to do everything in their power to unravel the circumstances surrounding the BVD that was found in the possession of the person arrested last Friday.
Robust
The statement said the EC process was robust and was not vulnerable to manipulation, stressing that “the possession of a BVD that has not gone through this rigorous process that is yet to happen for the 2024 elections does not affect the integrity of the elections.”
Explaining further, the statement said the voter verification application was designed such that it only worked with data that was prepared, audited, encrypted and signed by a secured process.
It said access to the process was highly restricted and, without access to the secured process, voter data could not be generated to work with the BVD.
“The data loaded onto the BVDs are set to be activated for a particular election day. A stolen BVD, therefore, cannot work in the December 2024 elections,” the statement emphasised.
It said the BVD, as part of its start-up process, checked for the integrity of the data that was loaded onto it and if the voter data on the BVD had been altered in any way, the start-up process was halted and the BVD would not work.
Restriction
Activation of the BVDs, according to the statement, involved the use of activation codes that could only be downloaded from the EC’s secure system.
The system, it said, was restricted to election officials with the right access credentials and that a BVD without its activation code could not be used for voter verifications.
“Since the voters’ register for various polling stations for the 2024 elections will be different from previous elections, any data on a BVD that was activated for a previous election will not conform to the voters’ register at the particular polling station on December 7, 2024,” the statement said and added that BVDs were only used to verify voters and not used to vote.
It said political party agents observed the packing of election materials, including BVDs while recording the serial numbers deployed at each polling station.
Additionally, the statement indicated that the serial numbers of the BVDs used on the election day were recorded on the poll statement (Pink Sheet) for each polling station.
That, the statement explained, provided further evidence as to which specific BVDs were used to verify voters at each polling station.
Background
It would be recalled that following the theft of five laptops which formed part of the Biometric Voter Registration (BVR) kits from the stores of the EC in April this year, as well as the vandalisation of five BVDs and theft of two BVDs from the Tarkwa Nsuaem and North Tongu districts respectively during the December 2023 District Level Elections (DLEs), the EC explained that a BVD in the hands of an unauthorised person could not be used to compromise an election.