A mechanism for an electoral electronic fraud in Venezuela

Considering the number of mail I have received and the observations left in the comments section, I think it would be good to give a more detailed example on how I think that the electoral fraud could have been committed. A little bit as a follow up of the diagram that I posted a few days ago and that seems to have helped a few folks.

The first thing, and I must stress that, even if a fraud has been made by the chavista side, this does not mean that it did not win the vote. And that is the saddest part of all! They might have won anyway but no matter what happens in the future chavismo electoral victory is tainted, with all the consequences for political stability that this represents.

This presentation is done in three parts, plus conclusions and what can be done.

1) how the fraud parameters were set

2) how would have this affected a favorable result for chavismo

3) how would have this affected a victory of the opposition

1) An example of how the fraud parameters could have been set

The first thing to keep in mind is that we are talking of alterations done to the electronic components of the voting machines. Only counting ALL the ballots printed by the machines could clear the air (first hint that this is a possibility is the CNE fighting real, real hard to minimize as much as possible any ballot counting: if this one is so certain of the results while not just go ahead and count all the ballots and shut up the opposition once and for all with a crushing victory?).

Let's imagine the district of Tucusiapon where the glorious revolutionary leader Pepe Bimba was born. He wants to make sure that the district remains in chavismo hands for personal pride. Unfortunately the polls indicate that it will be a tight race. What to do?

First, examine the vote distribution. The electoral system works as follows. There are three polling stations with a variable number of machines depending on the population. One polling station, A, is in a pro Chavez section of the town. This one has 4 voting machines. Polling station B with three machines is an electorally ambiguous part of town. And the opponents are concentrated in the district of polling station C with 3 machines.

Second, predict the possible outcome at these 3 districts. For that one has access to polls, local informants and any signatures that were collected for the Recall Election petition.

Third, set a top for the SI at several machines. Thus we obtain the table below. We can see the total voters per machine. For the sake of simplicity I have omitted abstention and assumed that since it is a small community everybody will vote (remember, this is a simplified imaginary situation set to illustrate how the fraud mechanism could have worked; including abstention would make the table more complex while strengthening even more my point). The next two columns show the expected SI and NO votes.

Next column is the difference between predicted SI and NO, the NO advantage,used to set the "top" SI. The programmers selects two machines in the A district because it is politically important that all the popular districts show a clear victory for the NO. Then two machines in B to avoid "surprises". Finally, to make sure the SI are happy, as they will the expected a victory in the C station, it will be granted to them but the total will be limited by a 76 top.

	total voters	Expected SI	Expected NO	NO advantage	set tops	SI	NO
Polling station A	123	59	64	5	62	59	64
	151	61	90	29		61	90
	131	55	76	21		55	76
	147	70	77	7	62	62	85
Polling Station B	117	57	60	3	53	53	64
	101	51	50	-1		51	50
	105	52	53	1	53	52	53
Polling Station C	142	80	62	-18	76	76	66
	140	73	67	-6	76	73	67
	135	75	60	-15	76	75	60
Results	1292	633	659	26		617	675
		49.0%	51.0%			47.8%	52.2%

The reader can observe that only based on the expected results the fraud would be undetectable. Polls are predicting a narrow victory for the NO and this one gets a little bit more than a narrow victory. You can observe that at no point there are two identical results in any station. There is only two 64 NO but in different stations, something quite probable. The 26 vote advantage of the NO is magnified to 58, a believable advantage and a solid protection in case the SI get a little bit better. If the NO wins by a better margin, the fraud would be diluted and undetectable even if ballots are counted.

So, what happens when the results are not as expected? Namely when the SI get more than what was predicted.

2) Chavismo wins by a slightly lesser margin than expected

This is where problems starts. The next table show the results with a narrower than expected NO victory.

	total voters	Real SI	Real NO	tops	Reported SI	Reported NO
Polling station A	123	60	63	62	60	63
	151	63	88		63	88
	131	53	78		53	78
	147	70	77	62	62	85
Polling Station B	117	57	60	53	53	64
	101	53	48		53	48
	105	50	55	53	50	55
Polling Station C	142	80	62	76	76	66
	140	77	63	76	76	64
	135	79	56	76	76	59
Results	1292	642	650		622	670
		49.7%	50.3%		48.1%	51.9%

The "real" columns are the results that are in the ballot boxes, if counted. The "reported" results are the ones reported from the "ACTAS" printed by each voting machine when voting is over.

The total NO result indeed is lower than what the programmer had prepared but still more than one percentile point than the real result. What went wrong in the prediction here is that machine 1 on station B had more votes than expected, as well as all the machines in station C. The consequences is that some results are identical! The two 53 of station 2 are coincidental, but the three 76 vote results of station C become suspicious!

There is also a NO repetition BUT again in different stations!

In this case the "fraud" could be considered acceptable and the opposition would probably accept it since it also had exit polls that told it that the election was very close in Tucusiapon. No ballot counting might be asked in spite of the strange coincidence. But what happens when the opposition wins more decisively?

3) The opposition wins

In this next table the opposition wins. In popular districts chavismo did not do as well as planned and in the opposition districts this victory was wider. Again, the first two columns indicate the real SI and NO votes and the "reported" SI and NO come from each machine acta.

	total voters	Real SI	Real NO	tops	Reported SI	Reported NO
Polling station A	123	65	58	62	62	61
	151	65	86		65	86
	131	55	76		55	76
	147	70	77	62	62	85
Polling Station B	117	61	56	53	53	64
	101	56	45		56	45
	105	50	55	53	50	55
Polling Station C	142	80	62	76	76	66
	140	82	58	76	76	64
	135	79	56	76	76	59
Results	1292	663	629		631	661
		51.3%	48.7%		48.8%	51.2%

Now the possibility of fraud becomes more obvious. Exit polls indicated a victory for the opposition and yet it loses the vote. But now coincidences appear in station A (two 62) and in station C (three 76). Note that curiously this time the accidental coincidence in station B disappears. And note that the coincidence in the NO result is the same as before, two 64, BUT in two different stations!

If it were not for the three 76, a casual observer would have found all fine, even though the rigging resulted in an outright switching of the results! And if the result had been a little bit more favorable, the coincidence in station B might have appeared as the third machine would have reach the 53 set top!

4) Conclusions

Proving fraud is not going to be an easy task. However it can be done beyond any doubt if fraud indeed has taken place, without even the need to count the ballots! "How could that be possible?" the reader would ask.

Well, the reader may start by observing that the "coincidences"
in the simple case presented here are for the SI votes IN SAME POLLING STATIONS!
This is very different from the similarities observed for the NO across
polling stations.

Second, it should be obvious from this example that the frequency of similarities between SI results should be comparable with the similarities between the NO results. That is, if 20% of voting stations show "strange" SI results, 20% of voting stations should also show "strange" NO results. If the "strange" result between SI and NO is too elevated then there is a problem that should be investigated. And if it is way off any statistical scale, then the election should just be voided. In the speculative case here presented the SI coincidence are more elevated than the NO coincidence AND have a different distribution pattern.

Finally, it bears repetition that EVEN if fraud is proved beyond all doubt that does not mean that Chavez lost the Recall Election! But it will be a total discredit to his rule, creating considerable difficulties for Venezuela as other countries would stop trusting a government that is able of electoral fraud. And the chavista section of the CNE should go to jail.

5) What can be done?

If the CNE is absolutely certain of its results, then count all the ballots! Chavez international stature could only benefit from such a move.

While the CNE stalls, the opposition must do a thorough analysis of "coincidental" SI and NO results, and of abstention results (not shown here but to which the same statistical rules should apply). If the numbers that will eventually be presented indicate statistical improbability, then the OAS and the Carter Center will have to swallow hard (have they have done elsewhere in the past)and declare that the result of the election is questionable. Then maybe a political compromise could be reached to make sure that the regional elections are fair and we will have to wait until 2006 for the final and decisive show down.

If the statistics are not convincing, well, the result will still be tainted and the opposition will have to accept it nevertheless. What can it do after is everyone's guess.

Or, no matter what, Chavez will say "see if I care!" and then all is possible.

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PS: a piece of unsollicited advice for the readers of this blog: if you live in a system with electronic voting with no paper trail, I would suggest that you get seriously involved in your community groups checking on it.

Saturday morning update

Sorry for the lame title but I cannot come up with anything else.

A couple of items.

Chavez cadena last night was to commemorate his 4 years since his last election. It was held with all his crowd. That is, in the background all his cabinet, and in the front all of his governors and mayors.

If he expected to present an image of unity and reconciliation, well, it failed right off the bat with that visual display, a visual disaster that the nice flowers could not hide. I had absolutely no incentive to go any further and switched off the TV.

His speech from what I could gather from the morning news was nothing new. The little bit of any olive branch he might have thrown to the opposition was immediately trampled on by himself. For example, he hinted that Globovision might have a hand in the Altamira shooting last Monday, because "Globovision is always on the scene" or some such sentence. A little bit like saying that CNN is responsible for the Charley disaster in Florida just because it was there, doing its duty as 24 hours news channel... Well, Globo, you are warned! You are next in the line of fire.

That is Chavez drama, he cannot help it, he must always be on the offensive, he must always have an enemy in front. For any sucker that hoped that in victory Chavez would start ruling instead of fighting, well, there is your response. There will be no reconciliation until Chavez destroys all the people that signed/voted against him. Like all the typical autocrats, he will need to reach 99% of the vote before he feels half satisfied.

On other more interesting stuff.

I have been corresponding with a friend that has put some doubts in my mind as to the ability to show unambiguously through statistics that fraud did take place. I mean, he has not debunked the fraud accusation, but it certainly will be more difficult to prove. This is an US friend that has nothing at stake in Venezuela and is only interested by the stats. I will let you know if something comes up from that.

I think that this will be all for today. I need a break and I got a good night of sleep, the first in a week. So for a change I will read, listen to music, exercise, comb my cat and get my place ready as my S.O. is coming next week of a few days of vacation. Long distance relationships are hard but they also give plenty of time for blogging.

See you tomorrow, hopefully Chavez will let me rest today!

Lazy Friday night with the Wall Street Journal

I was not planning to write anything more today. But Chavez decided to make a cadena. I felt like forgetting TV and turn on my computer to check comments. Someone sent me a link to an article of the Wall Street Journal free article section on the web. Supposedly that article is debunking all the statistical theory advanced by the opposition this week. It might even be the one that Rodriguez of the CNE mentioned. So I read it.

Well, using that article to debunk the opposition theory is a tad daring. I really did not find anything new to an article which is rather political than statistical and I did not feel that it was coming hard on the opposition. Mostly adequate comments considering what a foreign journalist could understand from our crazy situation

However I did find this little gem that I want all of you to share. I have cut and pasted from what was on the web page tonight at around 9 PM.

Aviel Rubin, a computer-science professor at Johns Hopkins University, said he calculated odds of roughly one in 17 that two of three computers at a voting table would have identical results. That compares to about one in 15 that so far have shown similar results in Venezuela's referendum.

I have rally no idea what that means. I mean, I think that there is some important information that the journalist forgot to write down. Because if I am basing myself strictly on this paragraph we can make the following calculation:

Let's assume three machines for three lists of 100 electors each.
I remind the reader that an electoral center was made of several lists of electors each with its own machine. That is you were told which machine to go to.
Probability to reach a result of, say, 47 in one machine is 1 in 100
Probability to reach 47 in another machine is 1 in 100
How could it be possible that the probability to reach 47 in three machines at once is 1 in 17?
I would have guessed that the odds would have been 1 in 10,000 but what do I know? Would someone care to explain this to me? Is this "17" result coming from some law of probabilities that I do not know?

I have written to David Luhnow with a copy of this post and if he has anything to add to this message I will be delighted to post it.


PS: not added in proof. Checking on the comments section I read again my post and there was a typo: it should have read as it reads now instead of the previous "...47 in two machines at once...".

Now I must also add that indeed one could lower these statistics by saying that the only numbers expected to come out are between 35 and 65, which would lower somewhat the 1 in 10,000 result, and this is probably what was behind the 1 in 17.

To which I reply that actually if we take an average of 500 electors for every machine the expected numbers are between 200 and 300, which would increase again the odds!

Regardless, that same SI pattern should also be found for the NO votes and so far it does not seem to be happening. It should also happen for the number of people that did not vote, and as far as I know nobody has checked into it.

In other words, if I were to find that 20% of the electoral centers have "identical SI" then I should find "identical NO" in, say, 18 to 22% of the centers, and also "identical did not vote" in the same range. But if I find 20% "identical SI" and only 10% "identical NO", then there is a problem. I do remind people that one has to compare center with center and not machines with machines. That is, 100 aleatory machines will not give the same result as 10 aleatory machines from 10 different aleatory center, which is also 100 machines. I mean, they should give the same result if there is no fraud, but if there is a fraud as the one I have explained earlier, a difference will be observed. Every type of rigging will show a specific type of result distribution. Nice Gaussian curves are only found when there is no tampering whatsoever.

The wonderful things about statistics is that it is the same with each one of the parameters investigated and thus we have with this electoral exercice a great experiment with built in positive and negative controls! Any scientist's dream, but perhaps every cheat nigthmare.

Now we just have to wait until the real experts finish their work and can prove that statistically there is a problem. I hope that I have illustrated the problem in a simple way. However I can assure the reader that calculating these statistics is not something done in a few hours!!!! Be patient!

BREAKING NEWS!
OAS secretary Gaviria back in Caracas

I am at home today for lunch (ah! the advantages of small town living!). On TV I just saw Gaviria coming back to Venezuela. He had left yesterday, I understand. Now, this is not a piece of trivia. Gaviria would only come back so fast if: 1) 35 people were just killed in a march, 2) Chavez started a coup d'etat and he comes to stop him 3) the opposition is about to call a general strike and part of the Army is taking its side to overthrow Chavez again and 4) a few more of such terror movie cheap Hollywood scripts. Then again he could have forgotten his tooth brush.

His lame declaration on arrival at the hotel was as lame as expected considering the reserve he has to maintain. However, his very first meeting is with representatives of the Coordinadora Democratica and AFTER that with the CNE. I find that order interesting. The reader is free to speculate as s/he pleases. I mean, Gaviria might have come back to tell the Coordinadora that the game is over. Or perhaps to acknowledge that serious doubt exists. What I just posted a little bit earlier still stand, and is even strengthened.

Time to take stock
Before we go crazy speculating on electoral fraud in Venezuela

These are tumultuous day. All sorts of charges and counter charges are been thrown back and forth, not to mention all the people that are trying to get their 15 minutes of fame.

Let's try to summarize some.

-There is now clear evidence that something went wrong, and abundant indirect evidence.

-No matter what people say, all these evidences put together cannot certify that one side won. THE ONLY WAY TO DO SO would be a manual ballot counting of boxes that can be certified as not having been tampered with.

-Considering that the ballot boxes have been kept by the Army alone, many of whose commanding officers have seen their impartiality contested now for years, out of sight from international observers and the opposition observers alike, for ALREADY 4 FULL 24 hours period, it is difficult to believe that most are still in a virginal form as to the safety seals preservation. They might, but an urgent certification is needed and they must be put in places where all political parties can watch over them night and day.

-The Electoral Board is stalling all the way through and through. Any audit concession is more difficult than pulling a tooth from an international observer. One side says all is fine and the other one says no and they cannot even meet in a single room to write down their disagreement. Which questions the existence of the CNE. It would seem that it did suffer an internal coup d'etat since now Rodriguez does as he pleases while even Carrasquero and Battaglini have not been seen since Monday.

In other words we need to know several thing quick:

-The opposition must present by this week end a full statistical analysis clearly demonstrating that the coincidences found for the SI and the NO are way off any expected normal statistical distribution of results. If this does not happen then there is nothing else that the Coordinadora Democratica can do as the other evidences only consolidate this one and decisive evidence. In fact it is my opinion that if the statistical evidence is clear enough then there is no need to count paper ballots: the election must be repeated with manual voting. There is of course a big IF.

-If the opposition fails to present statistical evidence good enough, then it shoudl shut up and wait for a real proof to come some day. Meanwhile all efforts should be directed at contesting the electoral system (for which they can get a lot of international help). This is extremely crucial as the battle now is: WILL WE EVER BE ABLE TO HAVE CLEAN ELECTIONS UNDER CHAVEZ?

This is no idle talk as the evidence presented is already good enough to establish that the system helped chavismo fatten its margin of victory, from the voting system that created such a chaos on Sunday 15, to the sick secrecy that surrounds all the doings of the CNE. Regional elections are coming soon and if the opposition cannot ensure that my vote will be counted adequately they can forget about me standing in line 5 hours under the sun to have my ballot stolen, as I am every day getting closer from becoming convinced it was done.

Electoral Fraud Update in Venezuela

I was contemplating the tedious task of listing all that has appered recently (and it keeps coming! Never seen in any Venezuelan election such an amount of people coming forward with "electoral questions").

But Miguel has done the job for me so I will think about other stuff to write about during the day. Meanwhile until my creative juices flow again I urge you to read Miguel excellent post

Delusional Probabilities

Miguel Octavio is a fellow scientist and certainly more of an expert with number theory than the Rodriguez shrink of the CNE who seems he could use a shrink himself, judging at how discombobulated his TV appearances are becoming.

Open letter to President Carter
Nobel Peace Prize
Director of the Carter Center

Dear President Carter

I am writing to you through this venue as I know through my Internet tracker that at least somebody reads this blog from the Carter Center. Surely these persons will be kind enough to forward you this message.

Let me assure you, before I do object some of your recent actions, that I have been a long time admirer of you. You have had a truly admirable career after your stay in the White House, and I was delighted when you received the award that you so richly deserved. You may read in this blog instances where I have praised your actions, and even defended you against some critics that did not share your vision.

Unfortunately your recent undertakings in Venezuela seem to have lacked the acumen shown in other visits. The highly embarrassing moment that you experienced yesterday in a Caracas restaurant when you were “caceroleado” (people hitting repeatedly their glasses with their knives to create quite a lot of noise) should give us all pause.

Before we go into examining how could you, and us, reach such an embarrassing moment, I will like to add that I do understand your basic motivations. Right now your country, and the future of your grand children, is greatly endangered by the events quickly spinning out of control in Iraq and elsewhere. I do understand that your priorities are to secure a stable supply of oil for your country and if in the process you must sacrifice the basic rights of the Venezuelan people, I understand. I do not accept and even less approve such a sell out, but I understand your priorities. I deem them very detrimental to the long term interests of the United States of America, a country where I have lived for 15 years and that I truly love. But now I am speaking as a Venezuelan and I cannot approve your actions. The leadership of your country should have seen the future in Latin America and not in the Middle East.

Which were these actions which have changed the very positive image that you had in Venezuela?

It is fair to say that the decisive point came with the private visit that you did with your friend Mr. Cisneros to President Chavez. The lack of clear explanations on such a strange meeting has led to quite a few rumors. It does not help that Mr. Cisneros, publicly reviled by President Chavez, is not particularly loved by the opposition. It all looked very suspicious for the lay man and already some stated that you came here to sell us out and protect your friends interests. Still, your sterling rescue of the “reparo” process was in all’s mind and we pretended that this visit did not happen.

But now, on August 16 at 1 PM, as we know now that you had been warned not to rush and emit an opinion on the Recall Election, you still went ahead and pretty much certified the election. Even as Secretary Gaviria publicly contradicted some of your statements. And you mentioned your obligations to your wife to a country on the verge of a civil war.

That night serious elements of a possible electoral fraud at some polling stations started appearing. These elements seem today worthy of close examination. Still you went ahead and stated that you did not expect the results to change. How could you be so sure? How could you say that so fast even if you were that certain? You knew full well that such a statement would induce newspapers like the New York Times to endorse the election without question. And yet some countries still edged their bets while Secretary Gaviria looked ill at ease.

You offered your imprimatur on an audit system that was immediately rejected by the opposition. There were clear questions as to the worthiness of standard methods of auditing for a possible fraud falling outside of standard frauds.

Did I detect some of the arrogance that cost your office, and should cause the same consequence on your present successor?

Very humbly I would like to remind you of the Florida mess and how the greatest nation on earth took a month to figure out who had won the most powerful seat on earth. Surely this sobering experience should allow you to entertain with your intellectual abilities the possibility of a fraud in Venezuela, one that should be examined adequately. Would a week be too much before making such sweeping statements certifying an electoral system managed by people that the Carter Center knows very well have cheated at every possible step during the signature and “reparo” processes?

Allow me to suggest greater prudence. Venezuela is ruled by people who have shown their mettle and determination to get what they want, the means being irrelevant. Validating them a little bit fast and leaving the country to its sad fate could come back to haunt your cherished memory. And the people that so devoutly serve the Carter Center could end up looking for another line of work. Peace makers need only to fail once to have all their track record erased mercilessly.

Please, do think at what has happened to us when even such a great spirit as you gets “caceroleado”. If you want to dump us and keep the oil, please do it with more delicacy or you will not be any better than President Chavez.

Sincerely, your devoted admirer until recently.

Daniel Duquenal