Vote Tracking Kicks Off

Ballots in the Dec. 5 municipal elections will be electronically tracked to ensure none are lost. Grupo Diverscan S.A., a leading automatic identification integration system in this nation, has chosen PowerID, a leader in battery-assisted passive RFID technology, to provide accurate, real-time data and minimize errors.

Costa Rica has been sensitive to the possibility of inaccurate vote counts ever since widespread charges of voting fraud touched off a brief civil war in 1948. The 1949 constitution included the creation of the Supreme Elections Tribunal (TSE), an apolitical body of magistrates to supervise elections.

All ballot bags will have PowerID labels to enable them to be tracked. At the end of balloting day, the filled bags will returned to a centralized vote country facility. Offcials will have ability to immediately ascertain if any bags are missing as well as spot the balloting center that "owns" the absent bag.

This will be PowerID's first application of the system in Latin America and is hoped to be used in further Costa Rican elections as well as other countries in the region. Grupo Diverscan also would like to apply improvements in government such as asset monitoring and access control of temporary employees.

However, at the balloting post, law makes it mandatory for observers, representing all political parties involved in the election, to make certain that all casting ballots are legally registered, that all only vote once and that all ballots go into the official bags.