Voter Registration Project

EISA and the UN Electoral Assistance Division (EAD) are implementing a project around the development of sustainable voter registration methodologies. The project is funded by the United Nations Democracy Fund (UNDEF) and the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC). It aims to promote development and awareness of sustainable and cost effective voter registration models, particularly in developing and post conflict countries. It will do this by analysing the relative costs, sustainability and effectiveness of low, medium and high tech approaches to voter registration.

EISA is aware that that there is a model working for one country will not necessarily be equally effective in another. However, the knowledge generated by the project and the experience shared will enable election administrators and donors to make more informed decisions about their work in the field of voter registration.

Project components

Mapping of material

Available material and documents on voter registration methodologies in Africa will be identified and mapped.

Online Database of Voter Registration Material

Visitors to the Voter Registration in Africa Database web site will be able to search and access available material using an online database.

Country case studies

To assess the registration systems in depth experts will conduct field research in order to assess registration systems in Mozambique, Malawi, DRC, Rwanda, Liberia, Ghana and South Africa. These countries were chosen to represent the broad spectrum of different voter registration methodologies in use, the different regions of Africa as well as three of the major African languages: English, French and Portuguese. For comparative reasons and cross cutting analyses, two non African countries will be included into this research: Afghanistan and East Timor.

Workshop

A workshop will be held in order to bring together stakeholders (including election administrators, experts and donors) to discuss research findings and formulate recommendations for future decision making strategies around voter registration.

Publication

The findings, recommendations and knowledge collected through the different activities of the project will be published as a book and will also be made available on the EISA and ACE Project web sites.