Proposal for free, fair and safe elections through mobile phones in Papua New Guinea
Joseph Kim Suwamaru · Contemporary PNG Studies · 2014
Frequent concerns on the credibility of election results continue to be expressed across PNG. Election related violence has also been commonly witnessed. More recently, the limited preferential voting system was introduced to improve the voting system and to give voters more choice in exercising their democratic rights. Despite this, corruption and related disputes show no signs of decreasing. This paper proposes the use of mobile phones as a cost effective and secure voting medium through the use of short messaging service and multi-media messaging service. The proliferation of mobile phones across PNG can be harnessed to implement a voting scheme offering citizens the opportunity to vote from the privacy of their homes and communities without the fear of being harassed. The pervasiveness of mobile phones can be utilized to improve the election process towards more freer, fair and safer elections in PNG.