There is little doubt that Jamaica's electoral system has emerged in the past decade and a half or so as among the best in thedeveloping world, helped in no small measure by the implementation of an electronic fingerprint identification system.

This has helped to eliminate bogus and multiple registration of voters, ensuring a much cleaner voters list. It is not so easy these days to over-vote in constituencies, using apparently legitimate electors. Election rigging will have to be achieved by strong-armed tactics.

Indeed, we welcome this development, as would anyone who holds the view that the right to legitimately cast a ballot is sacred to the democratic process. It is about being able to vote for the government of one's choice.

In that regard, this newspaper fully endorses any process, electronic or otherwise, that makes the system fairer, which is the aim of the next step of the process.

According to Danville Walker, the director of elections, the electronic identification of voters will be used in some divisions during the general election which is scheduled to take place before year-end. In this case, as we understand it, the system will not only 'read' the biometric information to ensure that the person who turns up to vote is actually the one registered. Having identified the person, the system will print the ballot, which the elector will use.

With that, we have no real problem, except that those who man the process must ensure that it works and that there is a back-up in the event of failure or any glitch. For, as Mr. Walker and the members of the Electoral Commission are aware, Jamaicans are, to put it mildly, extremely passionate about their vote and the political parties that they support. Such passion can turn to ugly wrath if there is an assumption that the right to vote and fairness towards their party is being impaired.

We raise these matters not out of any deep fear that such dangers lurk in Jamaica, but merely as a suggestion that we proceed with caution in the implementation of electronic systems as part of the voting process.

We are minded to do this because of recent experiences with electronic ballotdelivery and/or voting systems in other jurisdictions. Or course, we will be reminded that electronic voting is not an immediate option in Jamaica. We should, nevertheless, be aware.

Indeed, many of us will remember the drama in 2000 with the United States presidential elections in the state of Florida, with its dimpled chads, pregnant chads and hanging chads, and the complex and tense court battles over who really won the election because of major problems with electronic voting systems. Thousands of people were disfranchised because of voting machines that didn't work properly or were too complicated for people lacking the capacity to easily grasp the intricacies.

There were echoes of America 2000 this week in the regional and local elections in Britain. In Scotland, upwards of 100,000 votes were estimated to have been rejected and or/spoilt by people using voting machines. We would hate that to be the case in Jamaica.

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