On the advice of Coopers and Lybrand, the firm auditing ballot papers for Thursday's general election, security checks the Electoral Office of Jamaica (EOJ) planned to add to the ballot papers are not necessary after all.

The private auditors are of the view that the security checks already in place are adequate, and that no additional features are necessary to prevent illegal voting.

According to a press release from the EOJ, the auditors have advised that the stamping of ballots should not be pursued.

The auditors suggested that the presiding officers strictly adhere to established procedures to ensure integrity and control, the release said.

A spokesperson for the Electoral Advisory Committee (EAC) explained that the flap of each ballot, to be used on election day, has a serial number. After the elector votes and returns the marked ballot, the presiding officer will ensure that the section (the counterfoil) matches with the number issued, the spokesperson explained.

Indoor agents representing the parties will be there with a list of the numbers and can scrutinise the stub shown to them by the presiding officer to ensure that the ballot issued was the one returned and dropped in the box, the EAC spokesperson added.

The auditor's advice eliminates the need for the De La Rue security expert, which up to Friday, the EAC had planned to have come to Jamaica over the weekend, to help to work out new security features for the ballot papers.

Director of Elections Danville Walker had been in consultation with both De la Rue and the Atlanta-based Carter Centre to find solutions to the problem of the leaked ballot papers, sources close to the EOJ said.

De la Rue was an unsuccessful bidder for the fingerprinting contract which the EAC originally intended to have in place for voting in the general election. The company is, however, assisting TRW to make identification cards some of which are being distributed to persons who were enumerated.

On Friday, Neville Graham, public relations officer for the EOJ, said the office would be putting in place security features that "would invalidate any ballot papers that may be floating around".

Meanwhile, the audit of ballots is almost complete. Only two constituencies are left to be audited, Mr. Graham said yesterday.

Unworkable

The original solution planned by the EAC to counter the leak of the ballot papers, was found to be unworkable because of the sensitivity of the computers used by the EOJ in the printing, sources close to the EOJ said.

In order to invalidate the breach of the ballot papers, they were to be overprinted with a new secret code. But it was discovered that some of the ballots could not re-enter the machine because they were too wide. In other cases, even slight crushes on the ballot papers would prevent the overprinting, sources explained.

Based on the configuration of the ballots, the auditors believed that to be of any possible benefits, stamping in a precise area on each, would be required. The difficulty in doing the stamping would undermine authenticity, the EOJ release said.

By manually stamping the ballots, there was a risk of omissions, duplications and spoilage. Because members of the security forces voted prior to the general populace, there was also the risk of unauthorised persons duplicating the stamps, the release said. The auditors said that a stamp on a ballot on its own could not guarantee the prevention and detection of illegal voting.