The Rainbow Alliance has expressed serious concerns over the manner in which the tallying of the results from the Referendum is apparently being manipulated by the Elections Magistrates of the National Elections Commission (NEC).
In a press release issued last week, the group said, “in the first instance, we are alarmed over the fact that the tally of the Referendum vote has been delayed in the past two days when early tally results showed a resounding NO across the country on all of the eight propositions that the NEC had unilaterally manufactured in the absence of a new Gazette; and which we have stated is in contravention of the Liberian constitution.
“Secondly, the NEC appears to be focusing more on the release of the tally of the senatorial votes. We believe that since the senatorial votes and the referendum votes were cast concomitantly, both votes should be tallied and released concomitantly.
“Thirdly, our poll watchers have reported that the elections magistrates have been observed cutting the ballot papers of the Referendum into eight different pieces in the tally process. We take exception to this action which we believe is illegal and lends itself to the possibility of a miscount and fraud.
“We recall that all eight propositions were printed on a single ballot paper on which voters marked YES or NO. Therefore, the single ballot paper of the Referendum should not be cut into pieces or manipulated. The ballot paper should remain intact during the tally process. Any ballot paper that is seen to be mutilated by elections magistrates must be considered invalid.
“We therefore call on the National Elections Commission to be speedy and transparent in the tallying of the Referendum vote results which we see as equally important as the vote results of the senatorial elections. We demand that our party representatives be allowed to inspect all referendum ballot papers during the counting process to ensure that they have not been mutilated or manipulated by :elections magistrates, “ the release concluded.