Electronic Voting Introduced at the ISSF Congress to Elect New President

Lumi’s increasing reputation of supporting international sporting federations with secure and reliable voting led to them being selected to support the 2018 Congress of the International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF).

This was one of the most high profile meetings within the sporting federation sector of recent times. The historic and high profile nature of the meeting only added to the highly-contested and sensitive moment in this sporting federations calendar.

Changing of the guard

As well as Mexico’s Olegario Vázquez Raña standing down as president after 38 years in the post, secretary general Franz Schreiber, who had worked for the Federation for more than 30 years, also stepped down. And at the same time as the changing of the guard in the top two positions in the Federation, the meeting also had to hold 20 other votes for a range of other posts.

The presidential election itself was a highly charged affair with 2 candidates standing, and the outgoing president knew the Federation needed a system that could stand up to any amount of scrutiny.

It was a momentous and highly sensitive occasion for the ISSF under a great deal of public scrutiny. Speed, accuracy and security – as well as voter anonymity – were key. The technology support was vital in validating the voting, creating the transparency to give everyone confidence in the outcome.

One of the Federation’s biggest concerns was that voting should be conducted by secret ballot and being anonymous whilst complying with the strict requirements from the multiple elected scrutineers. Through Lumi's experience with other sporting federations with similar needs, their unique voting solution enabled this anonymity without compromising the integral security and required accuracy demanded of their solution.

Adapting to changing demands

It was anticipated that the first vote would be the election of the new president, however, on a prior separate matter, a show-of-hands vote was rejected and Lumi were suddenly asked to provide an ad-hoc electronic vote at extremely short notice. They were able to create the required motion in the software and distribute the hardware to run the vote very quickly and reliably. That helped to put members at ease when it came to the vital President’s vote.

There had already been a withdrawal from the race of a candidate but the electronic voting meant they were able to remove the candidates name instantly from the ballot. If it had been a paper vote, ballot papers would have need to be reprinted at considerable expense of time and money.

Another challenge was that there were more votes in the room than people, member federations were able to proxy their votes to other federation representatives. In a show of hands situation, this would have been incredibly time consuming and a real task for the appointed scrutineers.

In the event, the Presidential vote was, as anticipated, very close, with the new president elected by just 4 votes. The election of the General Secretary was more complicated, but also conducted very smoothly. Six candidates vying for one position with the winner having to secure 50% + 1 of the valid votes in the room.

Embracing complexity

The Federation then held a vote for its numerous Administrative Council positions. The sheer scale and level of complexity involved in the running of this vote proved to be one of the more challenging with several criteria needing to be met. 39 candidates competed for 15 positions, with members able to vote at any 1 time for up to 15 people from the list. It took seven rounds of voting to elect the entire Administrative Council. We had to take account of which candidates dropped off or withdrew after each round – without the software and the flexibility it provides, it simply would not have been feasible.

There was minimal let up on the third day of voting - the election of the Federation’s 30-member board, had to take into account new legislation that stated at least one member of the committee had to be female. Again, the Lumi software helped to avoid any controversy, provide confidence and ensure that the congress came to a conclusion well within the allotted time.

All in all, it was a monumental moment for the ISSF to switch over to electronic voting at one of the most important meetings in its history. The process was closely watched in the sporting federation world, and it was vital for the ISSF that the meeting was a success. Lumi delivered on the faith they placed in us and the meeting ended with a very happy membership and a very happy sporting federation.