A NOTA supporter notes that India will now allow such a vote (although without teeth) partly based on their interpretation of international treaties. To give you a little more background I was looking into the Indian NOTA and how it got put on the EVM as an option and the supreme court of India used the UNHDR and the ICCPR as part of the basis of their judgment. NOTA here is really continuing allowing the voter to ABSTAIN in secrecy through an Electronic Voting Machine, similar to spoiling a paper ballot, it was not the right to reject. I have copied the following sections out of their judgment: You can see how I got onto the trail of the UNHDR and the ICCPR. Though the supreme court was not ruling on ‘real NOTA’ they used the above 2 to justify the basis of allowing ‘negative voting’, and their other reasoning echoes our arguments for ‘real NOTA’ very closely. How far is that concept of ‘negative voting’ from ‘real NOTA’ really? (It certainly calls into question the current ban on the use on NOTA on the ballot based on the supreme court of India’s interpretation of sections of the UNHDR and the ICCPR) Even if you discarded the UNHDR and ICCPR from the legal writ, there is a very valid issue present in the voting system with which we need to deal; how can a democracy function properly, be a good democracy, or even be termed a democracy without the consent of the electorate? If consent is required there must be way to withhold consent that is equivalent to giving consent by choosing a candidate. The logical way present this choice is ‘real NOTA’ on the ballot. Can this idea fly legally? Even if the petition loses in the court, the publicity ensures (it is important to ensure we get publicity) that the concept is widely shared and will become better understood and people could well want ‘real NOTA’; then the ICCPR will kick in and we will get it. If it doesn’t catch fire with people as a whole, well I guess we are just not going to get it, unless the legal case somehow scores a victory somehow. Is there any way to push this legally? For example sue the UK electoral commission for not providing the option as it is logically necessary for a healthy democracy, it would certainly raise important questions and debate on the philosophical basis of our democracy; should not consent be built into the voting system? We are struggling as this idea is an anathema to many politicians of all stripes; it makes their personal agendas so much harder to pursue; so it is kept buried, we need to find a way of unburying it. I can understand the reluctance of people not wanting to get behind the legal petition as it risks ridicule, so proceeding with it needs a careful strategy and very likely some kind of recognized civil group sponsoring it, but that is for later if the basic concept has some legal validity. Either with the UN docs, or others, or without them and just based solely on the logic to it being necessary to be able to withhold consent in an election. Can anything be put in some kind of workable legal format?
Posted on: Thu, 20 Mar 2014 08:42:43 +0000
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