January 5 Presidential Elections from One Polling Station in Tbilisi

On January 5 and afterwards, the fair presidential elections are widely discussed in Georgia. There were over 3 000 polling stations in the country. A day at one of the polling stations:

7:00 AM…elections have not started yet. However, all polling stations have already opened. Commission members have divided their responsibilities by 8:00 AM.

Elections have not started at polling station # 26; but we can already witness some violations. The tables for registrars are placed by the wall; chairs for observers are three meters away from their table. Observers from the opposition and NGOs did not have any complaints about the fact. Just the opposite, they did not protest any proposal of the commission chairperson during several hours of the election process. The chairperson said that they did not need observers in the station because they could hinder the process. However, commission members complained about unorganized lists. A PEC member representing the opposition pointed out that he had visited families door-by-door and made up the voters’ lists. Thus, the lists the commission used during the elections did not coincide with the one he had made up because it contained deceased and migrated people, who live either abroad or in other cities.

The election process started…despite the cold, there is a queue of fifteen people at the door of the polling station by 8:00 AM. The first voter entered the office. The dropping of the control ballot paper was prolonged and people outside started complaining.

Generally on January 5, most voters were aggressive. They expected only bad things from the elections. People were convinced they would not be heard; so they entered the polling stations fighting.

The flow of people is not ending…time after time people wearing scarves and hats of the National Movement are trying to enter the polling station. They are not allowed to enter the polling station in similar clothes and they protest it. They claim they did not have problems at any polling station and why are they not allowed to enter our polling station?!

Generally, a lot of people appeared near the polling stations dressed in the “uniforms” of the National Movement; they met voters and offered them to circle number five. In most cases the situation ended with a quarrel. People said that National Movement’s supporters offered them money if they put an already filled-out ballot paper into the polling box and brought out an empty ballot paper instead.

Two mini-buses appeared at approximately 10:00 AM. People dressed in National Movement clothing got out of the cars, though ordinary people were also with them. Polling Stations # 26 and 24 were located in one Public School opposite each other; so it was easier to control both polling stations.

People are getting out of the mini-buses later. They went to polling station # 24, then returned back to the mini-bus…some time later they got out again but now they went to polling station # 26…they did not deny they had been in the next polling station. When we asked them why they were moving by mini-buses they aggressively replied to us. “Is it forbidden? It was cold and I got on it.” Soon activists from the opposition parties gathered near the mini-buses and after a long argument they seized lists from National Movement supporters. It was unclear who were mentioned on the list; one side shouted that it was people for “merry-go-round” voting and the other side denied it; they claimed those people were coordinators of the precincts.”

Nevertheless, an observer from the National Movement also had some complaints about opposition representatives. He accused them of pressurizing a voter during the voting process. He said that he was whispering to people: “Vote for Gachechiladze.”

There remains the question of how these people managed to take part in “merry-go-round” voting  if they are marked…Supposedly, they are not marked at all or they can remove the substance from their fingers afterwards. We carried out an experiment; I removed the marking substance immediately and afterwards the apparatus did not detect it at all.

The batteries of the marking apparatus went flat by midday. Spare batteries were not present at any of the polling stations. Thus, until they could buy new ones at the shop, many people were able to vote without being marked.

During the second half of the day, international observers visited polling station # 26. They occupied the chairs placed at quite a distance from the registration tables and observed the situation for nearly 30-60 minutes. They did not notice registration process, carousels and enlarged lists of the voters. So, it is unclear why they speak about a successful democratic election, because they were not involved in the process at all. They did not inquire into any details at the poling stations.

Foreign observers could not notice the people who were irritated because they had received several notices for the elections. Their arrival at the polling station was followed by a quarrel. “I have told you that these people have not lived here for ten years, why are they mentioned on the list?!” There was a case when a woman refused to be marked, but in the evening she returned to find out whether somebody had used her vote instead of her. Mini-buses appeared at 7:00 PM and they started the “merry-go-round” voting again...

The counting of the votes ended without violations. There was one incident where the chairperson of the commission personally took part in the counting process; that is forbidden by the Election Code. The results were the following: # 1 received 345 votes; # 2: 37 votes; # 3: 38 votes; # 4: 64 votes;  # 5: 199 votes and # 7: 1 vote.

Nona Suvariani, Tbilisi