The Quick Count and Election Observation

CHAPTER SEVEN: COLLECTING AND ANALYZING QUICK COUNT DATA
106 ing the same number at the same time. Careful planning is required to reduce
the chances of having information bottlenecks on single-number/single-line
telephone systems.
Alternative ways of
delivering observer
information to data
collection centers
should be considered.
Installing large numbers of telephone lines in any one facility and doing so at
short notice is often a challenge. For bureaucratic reasons, it may take a long
time to order telephones and to have the lines installed. Or it may be just too
expensive to buy, or rent, and install the needed number of lines. Even when
it is possible to install the necessary number of land lines, they may not be
dependable. For these reasons, alternative ways of delivering observer information
to data collection centers should be considered.
Recall that a substantial proportion of the data reported early tends to come
from observers who are located in the capital city region. If the data collection
center is located in the capital city, then one alternative to consider is the
possibility of hand-delivering observer data to the data collection center. For
example, organizers might consider having volunteers on motorcycles pick up
the data from observers at pre-arranged collection points and times throughout
the city. If one third of a country’s voters (and so, about one third of the
sample) live in the capital city, then using such an alternative data delivery
system to complement direct phone calls can substantially reduce the information
load on telephone lines and the number of required telephones.
Strategies involving the hand delivery of data, of course, are manpower intensive
and require careful coordination and supervision, but they can be effective.
In Malawi’s 1999 quick count, 16 vehicles rode circuits from three locations,
picked up observer reports and delivered them to these locations. The forms
were then faxed to a central data collection center. 2
There are other alternatives to hard-wired telephones to consider. These might
include the use of cell phones, solar phones, satellite phones, and radio and fax
systems. Each alternative has its own combination of advantages and drawbacks.
In most developing countries, people do not have the luxury of entirely efficient
and adequate telephone communications systems. For that reason it is
important to evaluate the adequacy of the existing communications system
well in advance. The next step is to calculate the load and distribution requirements
for a quick count communications effort. And the final step is to
strategically configure a quick count communications system around what is
available, so that the system that can adequately manage the information load
of the quick count. This may mean patching together a combination of communications
avenues for the delivery of observation data.
2
See Appendix 10 for additional information on the Malawi data collection process.