The UNM requests to re-count spoiled ballot papers

Shorena Kakabadze, Imereti

The UNM Kutaisi Organization appealed the City Court. The opposition party requested to re-count spoiled ballot papers from the Parliamentary Elections. The Kutaisi DEC #59 did not satisfy the complaint of the UNM to re-count spoiled ballot papers. 

The UNM representatives state there was unusually high number of spoiled ballot papers. It never happened before, during any of the previous governments. 

“More than 5000 ballot papers were spoiled in all three DECs in Kutaisi. It is quite a lot and raises suspects. I cannot recall similar incident. Everybody who has experience in the elections will verify it. We requested the DEC to re-count the ballot papers to be sure in the accuracy of information but they did not do that. The DEC #59 did not even discuss our complaint. They did not consider the complaint of the Georgian Young Lawyers’ Association either, which concerns the same issue. The local and international organizations stated in their reports that the amount of spoiled ballot papers was extremely high”, - Giorgi Ukleba, the Kutaisi DEC #59 member from the UNM, said. 

The GYLA’s Kutaisi office confirmed that they lodged complaint to the DEC and requested to re-count the spoiled ballot papers. “After that the balance was broken in the precincts #61 and #104 in Kutaisi, we appealed the DEC. However, the DEC did not discuss our complaint”, - Salome Saldadze, the GYLA lawyer, declared. 

Humanrights.ge contacted Kutaisi DEC # 59, where they did not confirm the information that representatives of the Georgian Dream also had doubts about the number of spoiled ballot papers and requested to  re-count them. 

“The DEC discussed all complaints, which were based on real arguments. We did not reject any complaints of any NGO or political party which were submitted to us before the estimated deadline. The court will make further evaluations,” representatives of the DEC said.

“Koba Narchemashvili, the single mandate candidate from the Georgian Dream, said that his ballot papers were also spoiled and requested to re-count them. However, the concrete representatives of the Georgian Dream did not appeal the DEC and did not request re-counting. It shows that, Koba Narchemashvili, in fact, was not concerned, he was just making PR”, - Giorgi Ukleba said.