76114E ANGOCHE FRAUD LEADS TO ARRESTS, BUT APPEAL REJECTED By Paul Fauvet Maputo, 22 Jan (AIM) – Mozambique’s Constitutional Council, the highest body in matters of constitutional and electoral law, has rejected an appeal by ASSEMONA (Association for Moral and Civil Education in the Exploitation of Natural Resources) against the results of the 20 November municipal elections in the northern town of Angoche – even though the Council admits there is strong evidence of fraud in Angoche. ASSEMONA is a breakaway from the Mozambique Democratic Movement (MDM), and seems to have a base of support in Angoche, where it came second to the ruling Frelimo Party. But ASSEMONA says it discovered ballot papers that had been marked in advance for Frelimo and its mayoral candidate, Americo Admamugy, which would have been slipped into the ballot boxes. It claims that the Angoche district administrator removed packets of ballot papers, and handed them over to Frelimo. Some of these fraudulent ballot papers were intercepted in the possession of a voter, and others were found in the house of a Frelimo candidate for the Angoche Municipal Assembly. Photos of these pre-marked ballot papers were widely circulated on the Internet. ASSEMONA also claimed that at one Angoche polling station ballot papers with the wrong serial numbers were found, and at another station 160 pre-marked papers were inserted into the ballot boxes with the support of the police and of a person referred to as the “Angoche District Electoral Administrator”. Since there is no such post, it is not clear whether ASSEMONA was referring again to the district administrator, or to the director of the Angoche branch of the Electoral Administration Technical Secretariat (STAE). The material which ASSEMONA submitted to the Constitutional Council included copies of the ballot papers marked in favour of Frelimo, a list of voters who were denied their right to vote, a list of voters who were registered twice, a copy of a voter card supposedly issued to a minor, among other material. When the Council asked the National Elections Commission (CNE) to respond to these claims, the CNE claimed that ASSEMONA was acting in bad faith, because it was impossible to divert ballot papers. The South African company hired by the CNE to produce election material printed and packaged the ballot papers and distributed them to the polling stations, under CNE and STAE supervision. The packages were sealed until the opening of the polling stations, when they were unsealed in the presence of monitors from the competing parties and candidates, as well as any journalists or observers present. But the Council then asked for further clarification from the CNE, which was obliged to send one of its members to Angoche to investigate personally. According to the Council’s document, this CNE member found “signs that there were ballot papers in the hands of people outside the electoral administration”. The CNE had thus been forced to backtrack and admit that diverting ballot papers was not impossible. The Council noted that the CNE now accepted that its security scheme for the ballot papers was “fallible”, which implies “responsibility on the part of the agents of the electoral administration in charge of guaranteeing the distribution and security of the ballot papers”. Furthermore the police had arrested seven people in connection with the fraud. They were presented to an Angoche judge, who released them provisionally, but set a date in March for their trial. The Council wanted to see further action from the CNE which should undertake further investigations to find out what had really happened in Angoche “otherwise this finding may feed speculation affecting the trust of the electorate in the seriousness of the electoral bodies and the credibility of future elections”. Nonetheless, the Council could not annul the Angoche election, largely because ASSEMONA had bungled its appeal. The Constitutional Council noted that the first document sent by ASSEMONA to the Angoche District Elections Commission merely informed the commission of the discovery, outside of the polling stations, of pre-marked ballot papers, which ASSEMONA had handed over to the police. It did not demand the annulment of the elections, or indeed make any other request. The district elections commission agreed with ASSEMONA that this was a crime and the Public Prosecutor’s Office should be notified, which then happened. The ASSEMONA denunciation of a crime, the Council, said, is not the same thing as a protest or appeal against the election results. It is in the realm of the courts, and cannot be decided by any election commission. Indeed, the law obliges district election commissions to inform the prosecution services of any crimes they become aware of. Both ASSEMONA and the District Commission, on 21 November, the day following the election, notified the Public Prosecutor’s Office of the fraudulent ballot papers. But seven days later ASSEMONA protested to the Nampula Provincial Elections Commission that the district commission had not passed its original document on the pre-marked ballot papers onto the provincial commission or to the CNE as “the bodies competent to solve electoral disputes”. But the ASSEMONA denunciation was not of an electoral dispute at all, but of a criminal case, and had gone to the appropriate bodies – the police and the Public Prosecutor. A separate ASSEMONA denunciation addressed on 22 November to the provincial commission claimed here had been fraud at all Angoche polling stations – but did not mention any polling station in particular, and did not show that its monitors had made any protests at the stations. A basic aspect of electoral appeals under Mozambican law is that the protest must first be made at the polling station where the irregularity occurred. If the polling station staff reject the protest, then the party or candidate concerned can appeal upwards – eventually all the way to the CNE and the Constitutional Council. But if there is no protest at the lower level, then an appeal to the Council is doomed to failure. Without any protest by ASSEMONA at the polling stations, the Council could not annul the election. The crooked ballot papers were apprehended outside the polling stations, before they could be introduced into the ballot boxes. With no protest at the stations, there is no evidence that any fraudulent papers made their way into the boxes – though a dark cloud of suspicion obviously hangs over the entire Angoche election. Days after the event, ASSEMONA claimed that its monitors did try to protest at the polling stations, but the election staff refused to accept the protest and that all monitors who tried to present protests were detained by the police. The Council noted that ASSEMONA did not present any evidence for these claims. In the event of polling station staff refusing to accept protests, the law states that the party concerned should immediately inform the district elections commission. There is no sign that ASSEMONA did this. The end result is that, although there are clear signs of fraud, and seven of those involved are facing criminal charges, the result of the election stands. For the next five years Angoche will be governed by a mayor and a municipal assembly whose legitimacy will always be in doubt. (AIM) Pf/ (1188)
Posted on: Wed, 22 Jan 2014 10:06:23 +0000
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