Six out of ten teenagers say they will vote in the October elections. The data are from a virtual poll promoted by the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef) in partnership with the organization Viração Educomunicação, with the response of more than 3,000 young people between 15 and 17 years old, from all regions of the country.
Another 21% still cannot say and 15% will not participate in the elections. In this last group, 10% said they don’t want to vote and another 17% said they won’t be able to get the title in time.
In addition, 69% said they were not old enough, some between 16 and 17 years old, which indicates the lack of information on the subject. Voting is optional in Brazil from the age of 16 and the title can be requested until May 4th.
The consultation was carried out through social networks with adolescents registered on a platform. According to Unicef, it cannot be generalized to the Brazilian population due to the lack of methodological rigor in the representation of slices of society.
But the United Nations Children’s Fund believes that the survey indicates that this public wants to know more about how to exercise citizenship in elections.
“This poll shows that teenagers want to be heard, contribute and exercise their right to participate. At this moment, it is important that they have information on how to obtain the title and, thus, be able to vote in October”, defends Mário Volpi, head of Unicef’s Adolescent Citizenship program in Brazil.
as showed the CNNin February this year, the Superior Electoral Court added the lowest number in the history of adolescents aged 16 and 17 with a title – around 830 thousand.
In addition, in a decade, the number of young people in this age group who applied for their first degree dropped by 82%, according to a survey by the CNN based on TSE data.
While the Court sees the result as a change in the Brazilian age pyramid and a consequence of the pandemic, experts question the parties’ lack of interest and strategies to attract this audience.
The Electoral Justice has been encouraging the participation of young people and, in March, it obtained a growth of 27.6% in the age group between 15 and 18 years, with 445,500 who made the first title.
In the Unicef and Viração poll, among those interviewed who do not know if they will vote or not, 72% said that the main reason is that they have not been able to obtain the voter registration card yet.
Among the total public, 64% said they wanted more information on how to issue the document over the internet. And nine out of ten believe that voting can transform reality.
“Democracy is made with the participation of civil society. In several countries around the world, young people have played a key role in elections and in building new dreams for the future of the planet. Four hundred and forty thousand young people took the voter registration card in the last month in Brazil, but a lot of people are missing. Our invitation is for them to take the title and help build spaces for formulating proposals for the elections that will take place in 2022 in the country”, declared Simone Nascimento, president of Viração Educomunicação.
The poll also brought suggestions as to why teenagers do not vote. Disinterest in institutional policy was pointed out as the main cause by 25%, followed by little knowledge about the policy (20%).
Another 20% see that young people do not evaluate voting as something important and 15% believe that the low percentage of candidates shows a feeling of lack of representation.
Already 13% indicate the lack of information about who can vote and how to take the title, while another 7% suggest other reasons.
With 15 days to go before the deadline for issuing the voter registration card, the document can still be requested.
The process can be done online and takes just a few minutes. Just enter the TSE portal (tse.jus.br), look for the “Voter and elections” tab, click on “Voter self-service” and select “Take your title”.
Source: CNN Brasil
