Mafia's 3G electoral fraud tactics

[R. A. Hettinga]

...From the "the only good vote is a vote you can sell" department...

Cheers,
RAH
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<http://www.reuters.co.uk/printerFriendlyPopup.jhtml?type=internetNews&storyID=2752458&basket=UK_INTNEWS>

Reuters

Mafia's 3G electoral fraud tactics 

Last Updated:                    15 May 2003 21:18 BST 

ROME (Reuters) - Italy's mafia organisations have come up with a use for third-generation mobile phones that makers of the  gadgets probably did not have in mind -- vote-rigging. 

Here's the idea: you promise a voter 50 euros (31 pounds) to cast their ballot for your candidate, send them into the booth  with a 3G phone, they send a picture via the phone proving that they have voted as instructed and then they get the cash. 

But Italian authorities have caught onto the plan and pledged to stop it going ahead in regional elections on May 25. 

"Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu has taken immediate measures to stave off any attempt to violate the secrecy of the vote,  with particular reference to the use of 3G phones in polling stations," a ministry statement said. 

It did not specify what the measures were. 

Mafia organisations in parts of Italy have traditionally tried to influence the outcome of elections to get favours in return once  their candidates are in post. 

In one infamous instance of postwar vote-rigging, mafiosi handed impoverished voters a left shoe when they went to vote,  promising the right shoe if they voted as instructed. 


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R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah at ibuc.com>
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/>
44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'

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