ECN refutes ‘results delay’ claims

This press release serves to authoritatively update the Namibian people on the ongoing process of the verification and eventual announcement of results.

The “delay of polls results by the verification centers” referred to by the mediais in actual fact not a delay but a process, as guided by the Electoral Act, Act 24 of 1992 as amended.

Firstly, in terms of the 2009 amendment to the Electoral Act, votes cast are to be counted at polling stations and results of each polling station were to be posted at that particular polling station at the end of counting.

This modification was to address possible suspicions from stakeholders on the transportation of uncounted ballots to the central counting venue, which in actual fact has been also the venue as determined by the Electoral Law, where correlation and verification of polling stations returns from presiding officers is done by the Returning Officer, as appointed by His Excellency the President of the Republic of Namibia.

The functions of the Returning Officer is to verify, correlate and compile relevant returns for the constituency combined election results and transmit them to the Chairman of the Electoral Commission of Namibia (ECN), in case of the Presidential election or to the Director of Elections in terms of the National Assembly election.

For purposes of these elections (Presidential and National Assembly) Namibia is one constituency; there has been a lot of tendered voting taking place. As known by all stakeholders the counting of tendered ballots is cumbersome and tedious.

Therefore it will naturally require appropriate time for the ECN to verify and announce the results. Another issue reported in the lo cal print media was the allegation that the office of the Prime Minister is hosting the ECN server for the voters register.

It is true that ECN approached the office of the Prime Minister to temporarily host the server of the voters register. However, the OPM declined the request.

The fact is that the server is hosted by the ECN. Secondly, it is also important to correct the campaign of misinformation regarding the release of results as carried in The Namibian newspaper of 30 November 2009 page 2. Statistical reflections of votes cast at certain polling stations are erroneous and misleading.

For example the newspaper recorded a polling station Ohalushu which is not in ECN list of polling stations to have votes cast for RDP as 3600 and votes for SWAPO Party as 2.

In fact Ohalushu Combined School polling station in Endola Constituency, if it is the one referred to according to the Returning Officer recorded a total of 802 vote cast and allocated as follows: National Assembly Elections Nudo – 1, RDP – 156, RP – 2, SWAPO – 639, SWANU – 1, Rejected votes – 3.

• Another example reflected in the newspaper is the Omafa polling stations where only SWAPO and RDP is said to have received votes, SWAPO 499 and RDP 510. In actual fact the results are as follow: Rejected – 3 Total votes counted – 331 CP – 1, RDP – 3, SWAPO – 326, UDF – 1. The other ten parties got zero votes.

• Berseba Community Hall polling Station in the Karas region is reported to have 55 votes for SWAPO and 36 votes for RDP according to the newspaper, in fact the total votes cast are 509 and the allocations are as follow: SWAPO – 245, DTA – 146, RDP – 53, COD – 22, NUDO – 4, DPN – 18, RP – 3, SWANU – 3, UDF – 2, NDP – 2, CP – 2, APP – 1, MAG – 1, NAMIBIA DMC – 1, Rejected votes – 6.

In conclusion, while ECN recognizes the fact that everybody has the right to share or disseminate information, it is illegal to distort, misinform or manipulate election results. The election results are very serious and wrong information about it can cause the country mayhem and the media should be prepared to account for the consequences.