The OSA has called for an end to discrimination of the about 147,000 Swiss living abroad who have registered to take part in votes and elections. “It is difficult to understand how the government gives priority to cantonal autonomy as the introduction of e-voting for the Swiss Abroad is a task of the [national] government,” says OSA co-director Ariane Rustichelli. She says last year’s parliamentary elections are a case in point to prove that the current policy of leaving the introduction to the individual 26 cantons has been a failure. “Registered Swiss Abroad citizens of four cantons had the right to use e-voting in 2015. This has already been the case in 2011,” she says.
The government last August ordered nine other cantons to suspend e-voting due to technical issues. As a result, only 34,000 Swiss expats were eligible to use the electronic channel, instead of 85,000 as initially planned.
… In a separate move, Nadine Masshardt has called on the government to improve the system of providing Swiss citizens overseas with the necessary ballot papers or opening polling stations at Swiss embassies and consulates. First trials were launched for nationwide votes in Geneva in 2004. Postal voting was introduced in most cantons in the early 1990s.
Full Article: E-voting suffers setback in parliament – SWI swissinfo.ch.