Local EC Can Not Divulge Polling Results: Election Commissioner
Wednesday, 21 September 2005, 16:30
Dharamshala: According to the election rules and regulations, the Local Election Commissions (LEC) are barred from divulging any information about the number of voter registration or turn out, Dr. Trikha Khenrab, one of the two election commissioners of the Central Tibetan Administration, was quoted as having said in an interview published in the Tibetan newspaper Bod-Kyi-Dus-Bab.
Dr. Khenrab was quizzed about the widespread speculations on the results of the preliminary polls of the Assembly of the Tibetan People’s Deputies conducted earlier this month.
Words are already out, the newspaper noted, that Dawa Tsering (U-tsang constituency), Gyari Dolma (Dotoe) and Gyalrong Dawa Tsering (Domed) have bagged the highest number of votes in Dharamshala in the primaries.
The 53 LECs across India, Nepal and Bhutan, in addition to one each for England, France, Switzerland and North America, manually count the ballots cast in their areas and send a top down gazette of nominees to the Election Commission (EC) here.
After the collation, screening and aggregation of polling results from various places, the EC is expected to declare the results on 8 November.
“But, before that, no one is allowed to divulge any information,” Dr. Khenrab was quoted as saying.
He also said that the EC has distributed copies of various regulations on voter registration, counting of ballots and confidentiality, and sent numerous circulars exhorting all the LECs to strictly adhere to these regulations.
“We will employ all the possible ways to prevent such acts in the final round of the elections.”
(www.tibet.net is the official website of the Central Tibetan Administration.)