09/25/2023 – 20:18
Federal deputy Marcos Pollon (PL-MS) filed this Monday, 25th, a bill that implements the printed vote and public counting in Brazilian elections, referenda and plebiscites. The parliamentarian advocates that each vote be “carefully read out loud” at each polling place at the time of counting. The themes were widely defended by former president Jair Bolsonaro (PL), in which Pollon is an ally.
The deputy’s proposal advocates the end of electronic vote counting and the printing of a receipt that must be checked by the voter and stored in a box next to the ballot box. Afterwards, each ballot box had to be sealed and signed by party representatives, the Public Electoral Ministry, a volunteer citizen and the presidents of the polling stations.
The parliamentarian proposes that the votes should be read out loud at each electoral session. At the end of the new counting method proposed by Pollon, the papers must be kept for a year in a sealed ballot box, so that “possible recounts” can be carried out.
“The ballot box will be examined by the receiving table in front of the inspectors and opened, allowing each vote to be individually removed from the repository and carefully read aloud, and then presented by the member of the table for visual inspection by the inspectors with subsequent recording on the ballot. urn. If there is no doubt, the next vote will be withdrawn and the same procedure will be repeated, successively, until the last vote”, describes the project of the parliamentarian from Mato Grosso do Sul.
According to electoral law professor Alberto Rollo, from Escola Paulista de Direito (EPD), reading votes is an outdated practice that has been replaced by counting stages that guarantee the reliability of the results. “It is no longer possible to go back, but to move forward. There is no need to sing the vote anymore,” he said.
Pollon’s proposal also includes regulations that already exist in the electoral system, such as monitoring of the voting process by parties and coalitions. Currently, the Electoral Court allows two delegates from each party or federation to be inspectors for each table receiving votes.
To become a law, the project must be analyzed by committees of the Chamber of Deputies and approved by the majority of parliamentarians. After this stage, the project must be evaluated and approved by the Federal Senate. After this phase, the text will be approved by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT).
However, if it becomes a law, there is a possibility that Pollon’s proposal will be overturned by the Federal Supreme Court (STF). In September 2020, the Court declared the printing of electronic votes unconstitutional, considering that this method puts the secrecy and freedom of voting at risk.
Deputy uses argument that resulted in Bolsonaro’s ineligibility
Pollon justifies that the right to vote would only be “effectively exercised” with a public vote counting procedure which, according to the parliamentarian, “not only ensures that the electoral process is public, but also offers citizens the certainty that their votes are counted accurately.”
“In this context, publicity, fairness and accessibility of vote counting are of vital importance to ensure that the will of the people is respected and protected”, argues Pollon.
Skepticism regarding the accuracy of electronic votes was an issue explored by Bolsonaro who, throughout his term, questioned the reliability of the Brazilian voting system without presenting evidence. The defense of the printed vote was one of the topics discussed in the meeting that the former president had with ambassadors in July 2022, which resulted in his ineligibility for eight years, following a judgment by the Superior Electoral Court (TSE) in June of this year.
According to the TSE, there have been no records of fraud in Brazilian elections since electronic voting machines were implemented in 1996. This voting system was created to replace paper ballots, which took a long time to count and were prone to errors. .
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