Tujoromajo Kasuto
THE Electoral Commission of Namibia (ECN)’s Chief Electoral Officer, Theo Mujoro, has revealed that votes recount for the Ndonga Linena Constituency for the 2020 Regional and Local Authorities Elections will be this Thursday.
This is following a High Court ruling nullifying the results in that constituency. The recounting of votes will take place at 10 am, at the ECN Head Office in Windhoek. Mujoro says the ECN A has finalised preparations for the votes recount in compliance with the Court order, which also nullified the swearing in of Swapo candidate, Michael Kampota.
The All People’s Party (APP) had submited an application to the High Court challenging the ECN’s decision to declare over 40 ballots as spoiled. Subsequently the swearing in of Swapo Party candidate, Kampota, was nullified.
In a statement today, the ECN states that the recount exercise will be conducted as provided for in terms of Section 105 of the Electoral Act of 2014 and stakeholders and affected political parties have been informed accordingly.
Mujoro adds that the ECN will ensure that all security mechanisms will be deployed during the recount process to ensure that the process is fully transparent for integrity of the results.
The commission hits back at a statement by the Swapo Party’s Central Committee (CC)’s Political Bureau (PB) regarding the recounting process. Swapo Party’s Secretary General, Sophia Shaningwa, alleged that there is a “well calculated” agenda against the party, taking issue with outgoing ECN Chairperson, Notemba Tjipueja’s recent comment in the media, that the ECN wrongfully declared Swapo Kampota as the winner, adding that Tjipueja’s words have already prejudiced Swapo.
ECN says that the media statements were purported as Tjipueja was quoted out of context by the Namibian Broadcasting Corporation (NBC) as she had already clarified. Thus, “the ECN has no further comment on this.”
ECN further says it has complied with the Electoral Court order handed down on the 22nd of June instructing the ECN to avail and allow the APP to make copies of the 57 ballots that were rejected during the Regional Council and Local Authority Elections in the Ndonga Linena constituency by not later than 14th July, 2021
“Only the affected 11 ballot boxes out of the 25 boxes were opened for that purpose in line with the Court order.”
Swapo Party is threatening to boycott the recount stating that it would not be participating in the recounting of votes but would only participate if there was an election re-run in this constituency.
