Venezuela’s Electoral Council Rules Referendum Petition Signatures to be Kept Secret

Caracas, February 8, 2007 (venezuelanalysis.com)— Venezuela’s National Electoral Council (CNE) yesterday announced that it will protect the identity of anyone signing a recall referendum petition to revoke the mandates of publicly elected officials, and will instead use fingerprints to verify the information supplied by referendum petitioners. The decision was reached on Monday, the first day of a two-part meeting which ended yesterday.

A statement released by the CNE last night, said that the new norms, “guarantee the right of the voter to request a recall referendum on publicly elected officials; and to impartiality, transparency, speed, reliability, protection, meticulousness and timeliness in everything relating to the promotion of and request for the processes regarding referenda and the respect for the wishes of the voter and the revocable public official,” according to the state news agency, ABN.

Article 72 of Venezuela’s 1999 Constitution states that all publicly elected offices are open to recall after officials reach the midway point of their term in office. To convoke such a referendum, a petition must be signed by 20% of registered voters.

The new norms for regulating the collection of petition signatures for recall referenda, approved by the CNE directorate on Monday, establishes the use of fingerprint scanners to prevent citizens from signing more than once as the best way of validating signatures. The CNE confirmed that the use of the biometric identification system would guarantee the authenticity of signatures and said this process of authentication would be carried out in the presence of both the official being recalled and those asking for his or her recall.

The new norms repeal article 31 of the previous recall referendum rules which stated that the identity card numbers of petitioners would be published in at least one nationally circulated newspaper. In addition, the list of signatories will not be handed over to those coordinating the petition. The norms announced yesterday will replace those created in 2003, which regulated the recall referendum against President Hugo Chavez’s mandate in 2004.

The last elections for mayors and governors took place in October 2004, thus making the officials eligible for recall as of October 2006, half-way through their four-year term.

After a controversial and long drawn-out process to collect and verify signatures for the Presidential recall referendum, the required number of signatures was finally approved by the CNE and the referendum took place on August 15, 2004. Chavez defeated the referendum with 59.1% of the vote.

The CNE’s decision not to identify referendum signatories is important given the controversy which followed the 2004 Presidential recall referendum. The opposition harshly criticized the government for making a list of those who signed the petition that activated the recall referendum public. This list, which became known as the “Tasc ó n list,” named after the pro-Chavez National Assembly deputy Luis Tascón who posted the list on his website, is alleged to have been used by state officials to discriminate against people for government jobs and services. Conversely, government supporters have alleged that many private businesses have also used the list to discriminate against those who did not sign the list when hiring employees.

The government justified the publication of the list on the grounds that there was concern that people who did not actually sign the petition were included on it. By making it public, people would be able to identify and report any irregularities to the CNE, which would then remove their name from the list.