AfriGIS says it has software for Africa's election systems

Accra, June 22, GNA - AfriGIS, geographical information specialists, says Africa has the potential of making her electoral process transparent and acceptable by the use of the newly developed and trusted AfriGIS software for elections.

The software, developed in South Africa and used during the June two elections in that country, has three dimensional motion graphics for quick announcement of results, a help desk and call-centre application.

It also has softwares to capture geographical base maps, software algorithm development for demarcation, delimitation software development and automated plotting software of bar coded maps.

Mr Charl Fouche, a Director of AfriGIS, disclosed these in an interview with the GNA at the Fourth Africa Geographical Information Systems Conference and Exposition being held in Accra.

Two hundred and fifty geo-information specialists from a wide range of sectors involved in development, and application of geographically referenced information in Africa.

The conference is being organised by the ministries of lands and forestry, environment, science and technology and communications under the theme "emergent Africa: geo-information and globalisation".

Mr Fouche said with the software it is possible to launch an election results system which is a web-based application used by journalists for reporting. "The systems consist of different modules which together provide information on votes, seats obtained by the various parties as well as key demographics and statistics on voters."

He named the different modules as votes boards, seats boards analysis boards and decision boards. Mr Fouche explained that voting information is capable of being displayed either as tables, graphs or maps.

This information can be obtained right down to the district level. "In this the information can be displayed for a particular area or a particular party over different areas such as national, provincial, municipal or voting district.

"Comparison of the top three parties within an area is also possible as well as information on voter turn-out". Mr Fouche said AfriGIS' expertise could be of benefit to Ghana in her 2000 elections.

Using geographical data, it is possible to tell the number of people in an area and other important election-sensitive qualities as spatial product engineering, spatial data and spatial planning.

Mr Fouche said with GIS software, the electoral commission is capable of releasing election results quicker, "for instance in one day, instead of a week which is normally the period election results are released in Africa and other third world countries".