Akhaltsikhe: Ballot Box Stuffing with Faked Votes

Gulo Kokhodze, Akhatsikhe

Journalists Ia Gegeshidze and Maka Lominashvili worked at the Polling Station # 4 in Akhaltsikhe district. Election process became complicated when a gang of people with faked ballots suddenly appeared on the PS.

Journalist Ia Gegeshidze recalls what happened at the PS at approximately 6:00 PM on the day of the election.

“Polling process was going on peacefully in the first half of the Election Day at the PS # 4. However, at 5:30 PM a group of young men entered the PS. Some of them definitely were not registered as on the voter’s list for the PS.

Initially they started to gather round the polling box. We called upon the commission chairperson to restore public order; however, all our efforts were vain. They started to push bundles of ballot papers in the box; they hardly managed to push them through a narrow hole of the box. We cannot claim which party they supported; however, we can say that commission members and observers calmly watched the on-going violation. There were on some exceptions to what was going out in open sight.  Representatives of the United Opposition were totally shocked by the incident.

“We journalists tried to resist the violation. Grabbed ballot papers from attackers and gave them to the chairperson. However, they still continued to stuffing the ballots into the box. We even tried to take photo of the situation but they blocked out hands and started a serious quarrel around the ballot box. We demanded that the police be called, which as the chairperson stated, arrived at the PS but they could not enter the voting room based on the law.

“Anyway we managed to take a photo but now they threatened our camera and left the PS.”

Journalists managed to spread photos however the quality of them is poor because people at the PS prevented them from being able to properly work.

Tamaz Petriashvili, single mandate candidate from the National Movement in Akhaltsikhe district, calls that the results of PS # 4 be annulled.