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+title: Election-appeals and by-elections expected in Hesse state elections due to severe problems with voting computers
+date: 2008-01-27 00:00:00 
+updated: 2009-04-18 19:12:41 
+author: presse
+tags: update, pressemitteilung
+
+Severe problems and irregularities occurred during Sunday's election for the state government in the German state of Hesse, where NEDAP voting computers were operated.
+
+<!-- TEASER_END -->
+
+In addition to massive obstructions of the election observers in several
+communities, a number of incidents have clearly disproved the claims of
+Hesse's ministry of the interior about the security and reliability of
+the voting computers.
+
+In at least one community the voting computers were stored in the
+private homes of political party members over night. This is an
+“established practice”, members of the regulating authority confirmed
+towards the election observers. All nine voting computers had been
+stored privately in this community.
+
+“The storing of voting computers over night at the homes of local
+politicians is the nightmare scenario for insider manipulation, even
+according to the logic of the Hesse ministry of the interior. This is
+something even we couldn't have imagined”, said Dirk Engling speaking
+for Chaos Computer Club (CCC).
+
+Election observers of the CCC were left alone for a long time in two
+polling stations, before the voting executive arrived. Manipulation of
+the election could have been easily accomplished by anyone left alone
+with the voting computers.
+
+In at least one polling station the NEDAP technology failed; a voting
+computer in Viernheim showed an error message shortly after the startup
+a few minutes before 8 o'clock. A normal vote was therefore impossible.
+It took over an hour until a replacement computer arrived at the polling
+station. During this time many voters were not able to vote and
+effectively disenfranchised.
+
+In Obertshausen interested citizens were refused admittance to the
+polling station by an employee of the regulating authority and election
+observers were even threatened with arrest.
+
+“The election supervisor in Obertshausen obviously hasn't heard anything
+of things such as openness and the legally warranted publicity of an
+election”, CCC speaker Dirk Engling commented. Some election supervisors
+actively tried to prevent an observation of the election in its
+operation.
+
+Observations from over 50 interested citizens showed that a large number
+of older voters had problems casting their ballot on the computers,
+contrary to the claims in the run-up to the election. Many were so
+overwhelmed, that election helpers had to assist them with the casting
+of their ballot.
+
+The CCC also visited the people in charge of voting in the hessian
+communities which had decided against using voting computers after a
+testing phase. CCC activists brought biscuits to the election volunteers
+in the polling stations during the counting. In the process they got
+interesting insights into the reasons for the rejection of the NEDAP
+voting computers.
+
+In previous elections, the town of Weiterstadt has used voting
+computers. “We were among the first who introduced voting computers. But
+after the first election we experienced that the effort in preparing the
+election was too large”, Mr. Gerald Eberlein, voting supervisor of
+Weiterstadt, said. “I just had the feeling it was insecure”, he said
+justifying the move away from the disputed computers.
+
+In Erzhausen the ballots were also casted on paper in the traditional
+manner. “We had rented the computers due to the counting and
+vote-splitting during our local elections, but the promised saving of
+time didn't happen, it just got more expensive. That's why we changed
+back to paper”, Dieter Karl, Mayor of Erzhausen, told the CCC. The
+advantages promised by the commercial supplier of NEDAP voting computers
+simply did not materialise.
+
+The discussion about the practical issues around voting computers shows
+that they not save labor, but also mean more costs and time for the
+communities, allow unnoticed manipulation of the result and cause major
+problems for senior citizens potentially disenfranchising a segment of
+the population.
+
+Many violations of procedures were noticed by the election observers,
+and the reliability problems of the NEDAP systems make it clear once
+more, that the basic problems of voting computers: the inability to
+verify the correct operation and transparency of the election. Neither
+voters nor election helpers were able to validate the correctness of the
+ballot-casting and counting. A subsequent recounting is therefore simply
+not possible.
+
+“The observation of the election in Hesse shows that the time has
+definitely come to withdraw the voting computers also in Germany”, said
+Dirk Engling. “Especially in the light of the tight outcome of the
+election in Hesse the unacceptable risks of computer mediated voting
+become very clear.”
+
+The CCC would like to thank all election observers for their commitment
+to upholding the democratic process!