‘Threat’ to data
security
An unseemly row
has broken out between the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) and the
National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) over the alleged ‘leak’ of
electoral rolls data from the latter. To add fuel to the fire, PTI has accused
the NADRA Chairman, Usman Yusuf Mobeen, of being a PML-N appointee who has
‘leaked’ voter information to the former ruling party to give it advantage in
the general elections. However, the picture is cloudy because of contradictory
reports, not the least of which reveals divisions within the ECP itself over
the issue. The perceived threat to the security of electoral rolls stems from
the sharing of age- and religion-wise voters’ statistics. Reports speak of the
ECP having written a letter on May 29, 2018 to NADRA expressing its great
concern regarding media reports that insiders have provided the information in
question to outsiders even before the ECP, a clear breach, the ECP argues, of
the confidentiality clauses of the contract between the ECP and NADRA of June
2011. The ECP as a result fears for the credibility of both NADRA and the ECP
as custodians of the electoral rolls. The ECP did clarify however that the
letter had nothing to do with the PTI allegation since neither the ECP had
received any communication from the PTI in this regard nor did it therefore act
on that basis. To make confusion worse confounded while waiting for NADRA’s
response to the ECP letter, it seems there is little clarity about the law and
rules surrounding the subject. For one, the ECP had provided information about
voters’ age- and religion-wise statistics on its website before the 2013
elections without any complaint from any quarter and shared an update with
media itself just two months ago. But by now it seems the pitch has been
queered by the Elections Act 2017, whose Section 79(3) is interpreted by some
observers as restricting access to any such data to formal applicants who have
to pay a prescribed fee for the information, while others say this is only
required for court cases, not otherwise. NADRA too is obliged under the Freedom
of Information Act to share with any individual CNIC holders’ data showing
gender, age and religion as well as electoral rolls. Meanwhile a NADRA
spokesman has denied it had leaked any electoral rolls data to any political party
and rejected the allegation of rigging against it as baseless. He pointed out
that NADRA had a limited role in the elections of only providing technical
assistance to the ECP.
Whatever the
truth of the matter, which needs the ECP and NADRA to put their heads together
and clarify the situation, the brouhaha created by the controversy reflects the
heightened tensions and atmosphere of suspicion, not just amongst the rival political
parties, but even against state institutions being accused of partisan
political bias, illegal help to one or another political party, etc. At the
back of everyone’s mind is probably the ongoing and not yet settled controversy
about Russian hacking being used to influence the US presidential election in
2017. In our case, hacking is not the issue, rather sharing information about
voters and their profile is. First and foremost, it needs to be clarified what,
if anything, can be publicly shared regarding voters’ profile statistics and in
what manner. Second, some light needs to be shed on what, if anything, any
interested party can hope to gain from such information. The matter should be
settled without paranoia or hysteria, and certainly free of any obvious or not
so obvious political bias. Such controversies on the eve of the July 25, 2018
polls can only add to the clouds of uncertainty and questions of credibility
already lowering above the polity’s head regarding the transparency and free
and fair character of these elections. The sooner the controversy is cleared up
and laid to rest, the better.
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