New Jersey: Appeals court orders more review of voting machines | Associated Press

A state appeals court on Monday upheld New Jersey’s use of electronic voting machines, but the judges expressed serious concerns about possible human error and ordered further review of the state’s safeguards. Monday’s ruling, which upheld a lower court decision, is the latest in a legal battle dating back to 2004 when state Assemblyman Reed Gusciora and others sued over the state’s use of the machines. The lawsuit claimed the touch-screen systems, called direct recording electronic voting machines, were unreliable because they didn’t produce a paper backup and were susceptible to hacking. Then-Gov. Jon Corzine signed legislation in 2005 that would have required all machines to be retrofitted with a paper backup system by January 2008, but that deadline wasn’t met and in 2009 lawmakers suspended it indefinitely over a lack of funding.

National: FEC Nominees Win Rules Committee Endorsement | The Center for Public Integrity

President Barack Obama’s two nominees to the Federal Election Commission — an agency rife with ideological discord and often gridlocked on key issues before it — today won unanimous approval from the Senate Rules and Administration Committee. The nominations of Republican Lee E. Goodman and Democrat Ann Ravel now move to the full Senate, which must confirm Goodman and Ravel before they’re appointed to the FEC. The Rules Committee had originally scheduled a nomination vote for Monday but delayed it because it failed to reach a quorum. “The Commission is designed to play a critical role in our campaign finance system,” Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., the Rules Committee chairman, said in a statement. “It is my hope that, once confirmed, Mr. Goodman and Ms. Ravel will work hard to restore the agency to a fully functioning independent federal watchdog for the nation’s campaign finance laws.”

National: Former FEC chairman Donald McGahn resigns from panel | The Washington Post

Donald F. McGahn, the controversial former chairman of the Federal Election Commission, resigned from the panel on Tuesday to return to private law practice, ending what campaign-finance reform advocates and political practitioners called one of the most consequential tenures in the commission’s 38-year history. McGahn, a Republican who had served on the FEC since 2008, clashed frequently with Democrats as he helped push a conservative interpretation of campaign-finance laws and persistent skepticism about government oversight of political campaigns. McGahn will leave to become a partner at Patton Boggs, which has one of Washington’s leading election law practices.

Editorials: A call for a right-to-vote amendment on Constitution Day | Janai S. Nelson/Reuters

Are today’s liberal politicians willing to go to the mat for a seemingly old-fashioned, civil-rights era throwback like the right to vote? If they care about preserving access to the franchise in the face of the many newfangled voting restrictions that conservatives are now aiming at minority, young or poor voters, they will. And, if they care about advancing the ideals of an inclusive American democracy, they must. When the members of the Constitutional Convention signed the United States Constitution on September 17, 1787, the democracy we have now was unfathomable. Today, the right to vote is not determined by property ownership, skin color, gender or wealth — as it was legally at the birth of our Constitution and for many decades after.  What has remained constant during America’s democratic metamorphosis, however, is the absence of an affirmative right to vote. On this Constitution Day, I echo the call to amend our Constitution so that it includes an affirmative right to vote. Proposals to amend the Constitution to include an affirmative right to vote are usually taken most seriously at the time of general elections, especially for the presidency.  That’s when the public is most aware of the frailties of our democracy. However, as we celebrate the founding document that has served as a model for democracies the world over, we must consider how to fill its hollow areas.

Editorials: It’s Time To End Our Failed Affair With Campaign Finance Laws | Paul Sherman/Forbes

It’s an old cliché that appearances can be deceiving, but, in the upside-down world of campaign finance law, appearances are all that the government needs in order to criminalize peaceful political activity.  That’s because nearly 40 years ago, in the U.S. Supreme Court’s first major campaign finance decision, the Court held that such laws are justified as a means of avoiding even the mere “appearance” of corruption.  Since then, lower courts across the country have taken this principle and run with it, upholding limits and sometimes even outright bans on the financing of political speech based on only the flimsiest of evidence. That might be about to change.  Shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court reconvenes this October, it will hear argument in McCutcheon v. FEC, a major challenge to federal campaign finance law.  And although the issue in the case is narrow, its repercussions could be widespread.

California: Campaign finance bills fare poorly in California Legislature | Los Angeles Times

After an anonymous $11-million donation from Arizona sent shock waves through California politics last year, the state Capitol seemed primed for new measures to tighten campaign finance rules. But several proposals fell by the wayside as lawmakers finished their work last week. Bills that would have increased the power of California’s campaign finance watchdog, boosted fines for violations and forced greater disclosure of donors — among other measures — stalled in the Legislature. Just one bill was sent to Gov. Jerry Brown’s desk, SB 3, by Sen. Leland Yee (D-San Francisco). It would require new training for campaign treasurers and mandate that officials study the possibility of replacing the state’s outdated website for tracking campaign finance information. Lawmakers said they would revisit the topic when the Legislature reconvenes in January.

Connecticut: In Bethel and elsewhere, minority parties knocked off ballot | NewsTimes

The CT Tea Party in Bethel is knocked off the ballot for the November election because of a filing technicality based on a two-year-old election law, leaving former First Selectman Robert Burke the option of running as a write-in candidate. In Westport, a local minority party lost its ballot line for the first time in 20 years. In Ridgefield, the local independent party line was bounced from the ballot because of the same law. However, Ridgefield’s and Westport’s cross-endorsed candidates will appear on the ballot. Local officials in recent days learned that minority parties in Middletown, Simsbury and Fairfield may have problems related to the 2011 law, which requires minority party candidates to sign certificates of endorsements filed with town clerks. Signatures are not required of Republicans and Democrats.

Editorials: Broken system – plan to move citizenship information from the Kansas Department of Revenue to election officials falls apart | Lawrence Journal World

So much for the “seamless” system of moving citizenship information from the Kansas Department of Revenue to Kansas election officials. The demise of the system touted by Secretary of State Kris Kobach when he pushed for passage of a law requiring new Kansas voters to provide proof of citizenship was confirmed in a recent interview in which Secretary of Revenue Nick Jordan said Kansas no longer plans to require people obtaining or renewing driver’s licenses to produce proof they are living in the U.S. legally. If people voluntarily present birth certificates, passports or other citizenship documents when getting their licenses, that will be noted on their driver’ licenses, but the Revenue Department apparently will take no responsibility for gathering or forwarding that information to facilitate voter registration in the state. The federal “Motor Voter” law requires that people be allowed to register to vote when they get a driver’s license, but it includes no provision for proving citizenship. State officials originally had planned to require additional information on drivers licenses to conform to a 2005 federal anti-terrorism law. However, after learning recently that Kansas already complies with the federal law, the Revenue Department decided to shift its policy. The driver’s license offices have had problems of their own serving customers in a timely fashion, and, as Jordan noted, the primary purpose of those offices is to issue driver’s licenses, not collect voter registration data. “(P)eople are coming in for a driver’s license,” he said, “and we want to move them through.”

Kentucky: Senate Republican Leader Open to Giving Felon Voting Rights a Second Look | WFPL

A day after U.S. Sen. Rand Paul called on Republican lawmakers in the Kentucky General Assembly to give restoration of felon voting rights a second look, a prominent GOP state senator says the caucus might be open to the idea. Speaking at the Plymouth Community Renewal Center earlier this week, Paul said U.S. drug laws disproportionately effect racial minorities. One of the consequences, Paul said, is voter disenfranchisement for African-Americans. The senator told west Louisville residents he would lobby leaders in the Republican-controlled state Senate to seek a compromise on House Bill 70. The bill would automatically give certain felons their rights back and passed the state House in a bipartisan 72-25 vote. But it stalled in the state Senate this year.

Michigan: Canvassers in Detroit mayoral recount send some ballots to prosecutor, judge | Detroit Free Press

Six weeks after Detroiters cast their votes for mayor, City Council and clerk, ballots are still being examined, counted and analyzed as the Wayne County Board of Canvassers looks into allegations of fraud. The board spent Tuesday poring through ballots at Cobo Center and made some interesting discoveries. Among them: Some absentee ballots in which Mike Duggan’s name had been typed onto the ballot, some absentee ballots were cast using pencil, and some absentee ballots in which corrective fluid was used. The board voted to send the ballots that had Duggan’s name typed in to the Wayne County prosecutor and the chief judge at the Wayne County Circuit Court for investigation.

South Dakota: Gant forming task force on federal voting money; rights group calls it delay tactic | Associated Press

South Dakota Secretary of State Jason Gant said he’s forming a task force to address whether federal Help America Vote Act funds can be used to open satellite registration and early voting offices on three Native American reservations. But the head of a Mission-based voting rights group is calling Gant’s move a delay tactic. “They don’t need a committee,” O.J. Semans, executive director of Four Directions Inc., said Tuesday. “He has the authority to do it.” The 2002 Help America Vote Act was passed by Congress to address voter access issues identified during the 2000 election. Poverty on South Dakota’s reservations and the long distances to polling places hamper Native Americans’ ability to vote, Semans said. Semans has asked U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to look into the matter, and the American Civil Liberties Union and the Great Plains Tribal Chairman’s Association support the request.

Texas: Hispanic group, NAACP join Texas Voter ID lawsuit | Associated Press

The Mexican American Legislative Caucus and the Texas NAACP filed a lawsuit Tuesday to overturn the state’s Voter ID law, joining the Justice Department in fighting the law. The two groups filed their petition with a federal court in Corpus Christi, the same court where other civil rights groups and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder are fighting the requirement that voters must show a government-issued photo ID card to cast a ballot. All of the law’s opponents are arguing the Republican-controlled Legislature created an illegal barrier to voting for poor minorities and people who live in rural areas. Minorities make up the majority of voters who do not have one of the six forms of ID required. Only the Election Identification Certificate is available for free from the Department of Public Safety.

Guinea: Opposition Says Vote Needs to Be Delayed | Associated Press

Guinea’s opposition leader Cellou Dalein Diallo said on Tuesday that he doesn’t believe the country’s legislative election can be held next week, citing flaws in the voter roll which he says will take too much time to fix. His critical assessment contrasts sharply with that of the United Nations special envoy to the region, who mediated a six-hour-long session Monday between the country’s warring opposition and ruling party, and who told reporters upon returning to Senegal that he remains confident the election will go ahead on Sept. 24. “The date of the election is still Sept. 24,” Said Djinnit said at his residence in the Senegalese capital. “As of today we are a few steps away from the election. Nothing permits me to say otherwise.” The U.N. has so far mediated 13 meetings between the two sides in an attempt to return the West African nation to constitutional rule. The country’s last parliamentary elections were held in 2002, and were first rescheduled in 2007. The repeated delays have spanned three presidents and have left the nation without a functioning legislature.

Rwanda: Kagame’s party scores landslide win in Rwanda | Reuters

Rwanda’s ruling party held onto power with a widely-expected landslide victory in parliamentary elections, provisional results showed on Tuesday, reinforcing President Paul Kagame’s grip on the country. The National Electoral Commission said Kagame’s Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) had won 76.2 percent of the vote with all ballots counted. Final results are expected on Thursday. Two decades after the 1994 genocide, the east African country has become a favourite with foreign investors under Kagame’s leadership. The order book for Rwanda’s debut eurobond in April was 8.5 times the $400 million sought, underscoring steady economic growth. But Kagame’s opponents have accused him of cracking down on political opponents and restricting press freedoms – allegations he dismisses.

eSwatini: Anger At Pre-Election Arrest | allAfrica.com

Musa Dube, deputy general secretary of the Communist Party of Swaziland, has been remanded in custody on sedition charges for allegedly distributing leaflets calling for a boycott of the kingdom’s election. He is charged with two counts of possessing and distributing leaflets published by the CPS at Kakhoza in Manzini. He appeared in Manzini Magistrates’ Court on Monday and was remanded to Zakhele Remand Centre and is due to reappear on 25 September 2013, pending committal to the High Court. An application for bail is expected to be lodged.

Texas: Lawsuits pile up over Texas voter ID law | Facing South

This week the NAACP Texas State Conference and the Mexican American Legislative Caucus of Texas state lawmakers filed a legal challenge to the state’s photo voter ID law. NAACP and MALC join the U.S. Department of Justice, the Texas League of Young Voters Education Fund, the NAACP Legal and Educational Defense Fund, and U.S. Rep. Marc Veasey, a Democrat representing the Fort Worth area, who’ve collectively filed three other suits challenging the Texas law. As with the other challenges, NAACP and MALC claim the law violates Section Two of the Voting Rights Act, which forbids denying voting rights to people of color. All of the challenges want Texas “bailed in” under the VRA’s Section Three preclearance provision, which requires states or counties found to have engaged in intentional discrimination to get federal permission for new election laws before they take effect. The NAACP/MALC suit differs from most of the other cases in that it also argues that the photo voter ID law violates the U.S. Constitution’s 14th Amendment equal protection clause banning racial discrimination. In addition, it claims the Texas law violates the 15th Amendment, which prohibits governments from denying a citizen the right to vote based on race.

International: Where is it compulsory to vote? | The Economist

Voter turnout has declined over the past few decades in many western countries. In America it has been below 60% in every presidential election since 1968. In Britain turnout reached 65% in the 2010 general election, down from 84% in 1950. But there are no such worries in Australia, where Tony Abbott was sworn in as prime minister on September 18th. According to Australia’s electoral commission, turnout in the election on September 7th was 91%. This was no one-off: nine out of ten Australian voters have trudged to the polls (or voted by post) in every federal election since 1925. The reason Australians vote so faithfully is simple: they have to, because failing to vote is illegal. Where else is democracy an obligation rather than a right? Plenty of countries have flirted with compulsory voting. IDEA, an international organisation that promotes democracy, lists 38 countries that have mandatory voting in place or have done so in the past. They include America: the state of Georgia made voting compulsory in its 1777 constitution, subject to a fine, unless the person could provide a “reasonable excuse” (see Article 12). In many countries voting is compulsory in theory, but seldom or never enforced. Voting is obligatory in most of Latin America, for instance. But in Mexico, which is among the countries where abstaining is illegal, turnout in last year’s presidential election was only 63%.

National: PACs spent more at state level than on federal campaigns | Washington Post

Political action committees spent more money on state-level candidates in just 23 states during the 2012 election cycle than they did on federal candidates in all 50 states, according to a new analysis. The analysis from the Sunlight Foundation shows state-level PACs dished out $1.4 billion to candidates running for governor, attorney general, state legislative and other non-federal offices in those states. All told, PACs spent $1.2 billion on federal candidates. State PACs do not have to report their spending to the Federal Election Commission. Instead, they report to campaign finance organizations in the states in which they spend money, all of which have different rules for reporting, disclosure and spending.

Voting Blogs: The Corporation and the Little Guy in the 11th Circuit | More Soft Money Hard Law

The Campaign Legal Center has alerted its readers to a “flood” of challenges to campaign finance laws, and its message is that the reform advocates must remain at their battle stations. It is certainly true that interests hostile to any campaign finance regulation are hard at work; they might well believe that in this time, with this Supreme Court, their moment has come and no time should be wasted. But not all of these challenges are fairly lumped together and described as one indiscriminate assault against any and all reasonable regulation. A few raise questions that even those favoring reasonable limits on campaign finance should take—and address—seriously. The case of Worley v. Fla. Sec’y of State, 717 F.3d 1238 (11th Cir. 2013), is one such case, a challenge to an application of a state requirement that individuals supporting or opposing a ballot initiative must register and report through a political action committee (PAC). The Eleventh Circuit rejected the claim, which is now before the Supreme Court on a petition for certiorari. The four petitioners in Worley argue that PAC requirements, if a burden on corporations in the manner described by the Supreme Court in Citizens United, must fall even more heavily and just as permissibly on individuals banded together in limited, inexpensive “grassroots” political enterprises.

Alabama: Secret Society Dips Toe in City Politics, Prompting Lawsuit | New York Times

The college students began arriving a little before lunch at Calvary Baptist Church, far more than usual for a local election. The poll workers knew immediately: the Machine was here. The school year at the University of Alabama has barely gotten started, and already the campus has found itself in a charged self-examination on issues of politics, power and race, with the exposure of tenacious segregation among fraternities and sororities drawing national attention. But the turmoil began some weeks earlier. It raised the specter of the Machine, a secret society representing a league of select and almost exclusively white fraternities and sororities, which has been around for a century or more. Once a breeding ground for state political leaders, the Machine (it has long been known by that nickname) today maintains a solid hold on student government through an effective, and critics say coercive, brand of old-fashioned organization politics. But the Machine’s apparent involvement in an August school board election, a rare appearance in municipal politics, has prompted a lawsuit, accusations of voter fraud and an outcry that in many ways primed the campus for the larger storm over inclusion and tradition that is now taking place.

Florida: State Supreme Court Gets Redistricting Case | The Ledger

A coalition of voting-rights groups trying to get lawmakers to testify about the 2012 redistricting process asked a skeptical Supreme Court on Monday to rule that legislators should not be shielded from speaking in court. Those challenging new district maps under the anti-gerrymandering “Fair Districts” state constitutional amendments are appealing a 1st District Court of Appeal ruling that prevents the legislators who drew the districts from having to testify about “objective” facts about the redistricting process. The Supreme Court has no definitive timeline for ruling on the question. A lower court had initially ruled that the lawmakers should have to testify, though the trial court didn’t order lawmakers to testify about “subjective” issues, like why they made certain decisions.

Indiana: Judge: Suit challenging Marion County judicial slating may proceed | The Indiana Lawyer

A federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of a state law that has given rise to the Democratic and Republican slating system under which Marion Superior judges are elected will go forward. Chief Judge Richard Young of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana last week denied a motion to dismiss brought by state officials and interests named in a suit brought by Common Cause and the American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana. Common Cause, a nonpartisan group whose mission is to promote open, honest government and voting rights, seeks an injunction against enforcement of Indiana Code 33-33-49-13. The suit says that law, which sets forth the process for electing judges in the Marion Superior Courts, is “unique in Indiana, and perhaps in the nation.”

Michigan: Elections workers slog through Detroit mayoral recount | Detroit Free Press

Wayne County elections workers are expected to begin their eighth day recounting ballots from disputed Detroit elections this morning, and little information is being made available on how much longer the recount will take — or how much it is costing. County officials said Monday that about 80% of the ballots have been counted. Paperwork then has to be completed after the count. Delphine Oden, Wayne County’s director of elections, declined to say Monday when she expected the recount to end. The recount was approved by the Wayne County Board of Canvassers, which is looking into allegations of fraud detailed in a petition filed by former mayoral candidate Tom Barrow. Barrow’s allegations include, among other things, that the number of applications for absentee ballots was lower than the number of absentee votes cast, and that similar handwriting appears on several ballots cast for former Detroit Medical Center CEO Mike Duggan, who will face Wayne County Sheriff Benny Napoleon in November’s general election. Carol Larkin, chair of the Wayne County Board of Canvassers, said the overall cost for the recount appears headed closer to $100,000 than the $500,000 price tag Barrow has suggested. “We won’t know the total until it’s done,” she said. “It is going to get costly, though.”

New York: Campaign-Finance Law Worked, but New Yorkers Still Won’t Celebrate It | New Republic

The second-day story from New York City’s primaries last week could have been the exceptional performance of the city’s unique system of small-donor public financing. By providing a six-dollar public match for every dollar raised in contributions of $175 or less, the system enabled the little-known Scott Stringer to compete with and defeat Eliot Spitzer’s family fortune in the race for Comptroller. On the Republican side, it helped mayoral nominee Joe Lhota, who received almost half his total spending in public money, to overcome another self-financed millionaire. The top three Democratic candidates for mayor finished in reverse order of the amount of private money they had raised, and as Alec MacGillis noted here, public financing allowed the eventual nominee, Bill de Blasio, to resist the policy preferences of big donors, such as opposition to paid sick leave. Dozens of city council and other races featured three or more candidates with enough money to compete. But instead of celebrating a system that finally emerged from the shadows of Michael Bloomberg’s personal spending to show its value, we’ve had handwringing about the rise of “outside money,” or spending by groups other than the candidates and parties, in New York City politics. Jim Dwyer in The New York Times argued that outside spending was “reshaping” city politics, focusing on three independent committees: one that promoted “Anybody But [Christine] Quinn,” based on the City Council speaker’s refusal to block horse carriages from Central Park; a tiny committee formed to support Lhota, with contributions solely from David and Julia Koch; and Jobs for New York, the biggest outside spender, a front for the real estate industry.

New York: Mayoral race narrows as Thompson cedes to De Blasio | Los Angeles Times

The race to become New York City’s next mayor narrowed Monday as the runner-up in last week’s Democratic primary ended his campaign and endorsed Bill de Blasio, the liberal public advocate who has cast himself as the anti-Michael Bloomberg. But Bill Thompson, who captured just over 26% of the vote in the Sept. 10 primary, did not go out with a whimper as he announced his withdrawal at a news conference outside City Hall. Thompson, facing his second failed attempt at the mayor’s office, lashed out at the Board of Elections for taking days to count all the primary ballots, saying it made it impossible to campaign for what might have been a Thompson-De Blasio runoff on Oct. 1. “In the greatest city in the world, in the greatest democracy on Earth, we ought to be able to count all the votes,” said Thompson, who ran against Bloomberg in 2009. Tens of thousands of votes — including absentee ballots and paper ballots cast by voters who encountered malfunctioning voting machines — have not been counted and are not expected to be tallied until next week.

Editorials: Thompson Bows Out – Calls NYC Board of Elections a “Disgrace,” Needs Replacement with Professionals | New York Times

William Thompson Jr. made a gracious exit from the race for mayor of New York on Monday, throwing his support to Bill de Blasio, who probably got slightly more than 40 percent of the vote in last Tuesday’s Democratic primary, which he needed to avoid a runoff with Mr. Thompson. We say probably because the New York City Board of Elections hasn’t finished counting the votes. For the last week, Mr. Thompson has been in the awkward position of hanging around to see whether Mr. de Blasio’s unofficial 40.3 percent holds up. Mr. Thompson, who got 26.2 percent of the vote, saw that his odds were very long, and got on with his life. In leaving the race, Mr. Thompson called the board’s failure to deliver official results nearly a week after the vote a “disgrace.” He’s right, though its incompetence is hardly a surprise.

Texas: Rights groups seeking millions in legal fees over redistricting battle | San Antonio Express-News

Attorney General Greg Abbott’s defense of a now-defunct 2011 redistricting plan could leave the state on the hook for a roughly $6 million legal tab to pay civil rights groups that sued to block the maps. That’s the ballpark total for reimbursement requests from plaintiffs waging a years-long legal war with Abbott over redistricting maps passed by the Republican-led Legislature in 2011. Federal judges have deemed those maps discriminatory to minority voters, and they were never used. A three-judge panel in San Antonio drew interim maps for the 2012 election for the Texas House and Senate and the U.S. Congress. Led by Abbott and Gov. Rick Perry, state Republicans decided months ago to abandon the 2011 maps and replace them permanently with the political boundaries drawn by the judges. The Legislature approved the plans during a special session this summer.

Australia: Palmer calls for fresh election in Fairfax | Australian Broadcasting Corporation

Businessman and political aspirant Clive Palmer has demanded a new election in the federal seat of Fairfax on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast. His lead over the LNP’s Ted O’Brien in Fairfax has narrowed to only 209 votes, with about 88 per cent of ballot papers counted. Mr Palmer, who founded the Palmer United Party (PUP), says the election is rigged and the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) is a national disgrace. He says 768 pre-poll votes from one booth went missing from the voting centre at Coolum Beach, and later turned up at Buderim. On Monday afternoon, the AEC released a statement saying the sorting error makes no difference to the count overall, and it remains confident in the integrity of its processes. However, the Federal Court says the AEC’s media release on Monday suggested there was a reserved judgment.  The court says today Justice Dowsett indicated he would reserve the question of costs in respect of Monday’s hearing, but otherwise Mr Palmer’s application was denied.

Cameroon: Voter ID Card Controversy Mars Cameroon Campaign | VoA News

Campaigning for parliamentary and local elections is officially underway in Cameroon, amid controversy over the alleged fabrication and buying of fake voter cards ahead of the September 30 poll. Loudspeakers placed at strategic locations and in populous neighborhoods of Cameroon’s capital blare campaign messages by 35 political parties running in council and parliamentary elections this month. This message by one opposition party, the National Union for Democracy and Progress, promises to unite the country and keep it out of conflict. Meanwhile, Denis Kemlemo, a candidate with the main opposition Social Democratic Front, tells VOA he will focus on reviving the economy.  “Our economy is failing due to the adoption of unrealistic budgets, absence of true social justice and snail pace development.  It is for this reason that we are begging for your support during these upcoming parliamentary and council elections to help bring the change that we desperately need,” he said. But the campaigns have been overshadowed by a simmering controversy over voter registration.

Rwanda: A Strange Electoral System For A Unique Country – Rwanda Votes For Parliament | International Business Times

A national parliamentary election began Monday in the East African country of Rwanda, and the ruling Rwandan Patriotic Front, or RPF, is expected to maintain control over the national government. This is no ordinary election. Rwanda’s electoral process is unique, as is the East African country of 12 million, an international aid darling whose violent past has given way to dazzling economic growth and development, but whose repressive tendencies are frequently criticized by domestic dissidents and global human rights groups. Rwanda’s parliament is bicameral. The upper house — the Senate, with 26 seats — is indirectly elected by various political groups and institutions, while the lower house — the Chamber of Deputies, with 80 seats — has 53 members elected by the people, with 27 indirectly elected by special interest groups. Of those 27 seats, 24 are reserved for women, two are for young people and one must be filled by a disabled person.