Official Vote at Polling Station, Khelvachauri District, Adjara “Null and Void”

Maka Malakmadze,Khelvachauri

I came to the village Akhalsopeli Precinct # 37, Khelvachauri District, Adjara at 6:48 am on November 3, 2008. I was planning to stay here for 15 minutes only. However, this is only if I do not observe any election violations. However, taking into consideration that there was a big fight in Precinct # 37 on May 21, 2008, the day of the so-called snap Parliamentary Elections and many election violations were observed, so I thought that I would actually have had to stay here for more than 15 minutes. Surprisingly, in retrospect, however, the election results from the Precinct # 37 were not invalidated following the May 21, 2008 election – much to my surprise.

It is interesting that both the PEC members and the political party observers are inhabitants of the village of Akhalsopeli. It was difficult for me to work at this station because both the PEC chairperson and deputy chairperson used to be my teachers at school.  I continue to live in this village as well. I told them from the beginning that I would perform my duties as an observer in an unbiased way, and that they could not prevent me from uncovering any possible election violations, if any would occur. After having said this, they started mistreating me in response.

Official procedures that preceded the start of voting were completed before 8 AM and the designated secretary opened the record book and all the independent observers and party representatives were properly registered. The obligations were redistributed among the commission members by casting lots. The first voter cast his vote at 8: 02 am. Everything seemed to be going normally but….

The first conflict with me (I was representing NGO Fair Election Foundation) and the PEC started when I saw that there were two National Movement observers in the polling station which was against the Georgian Election Code. I reprimanded the Akhalsopeli # 37 PEC chairperson for this apparently illegal act and demanded that one of the National Movement observers have to leave the polling station. One of them was Simon Zakaradze, former head of Gorio Village Community. He protested against my demand but in the end he admitted that I was legally correct.

When several voters entered the polling station I noticed that 2 or three young men tried to enter the polling station without their fingers checked with UV lamp for ink.
Only I observed the work of registrars. It seemed that another observer from NGO Young Journalists Association did not care about the election developments, as this person did not protest against any of the clear cut violations. It was rather difficult for me to stand up alone in having controlled all registrars when there were many voters in the polling station at one time.

I wrote the first complaint about an instance of a voter stuffing several ballot papers into one envelope. After noticing it I demanded that the voter showed me the envelope, so that I could see how many ballots he had actually put in the envelope. As an observer I had the right to that. However, the voter refused to show it to me. I informed the PEC chairperson about my allegation of election violation. However, he did not take any measures in response. It is noteworthy that I observed only two instances of this kind of violation. However, it turned out during the counting that there were a total of 16 envelops with multiple ballot papers.

The Akhalsopeli village Precinct # 37 PEC, and Zaal Zaalishvili, the DEC representative proceeded to discuss my complaint about the stuffing of two ballots into one envelope but without having informed me. When I asked what the commission decided to do about my complaint, this is what the PEC chairperson answered in a written form: “The commission does not confirm the alleged fact of election violation but will try to eradicate such things from happening in the future.”

The voters turn out was not that high and the questions the party representatives from various parties were asking the voters: how is you husband (if it was a woman)? Is he coming to the election? National Movement observer’s curiosity was based on the fact that he “had not seen his neighbors- the voters for a long time”. 

At noon I spoke with a stranger (later it turned out that he was Anzor Malakmadze), who was in the year outside the polling station.
-Please do not impede with the election process. We are promised with a good job and money, as much as you wish. You can also receive money this day, he said

- Do I disturb anyone? What have I done wrong?

- Let the election commission work as will get results as you may want.

- Where do you work?

- I represent the business of Cossacks in Adjara Region, and not a problem for me to find a job for you. I do not want them to have bad memories about our last name (both of us are Malakmadzes). Please, accept my offer.

“Unfortunately”, I did not agree on Mr. Malakmadze’s offer.

I spoke about my conversation with Mr. Malakmadze with the DEC representative. The Akhalsopeli # 37 PEC chairperson and Murad Narakidze, Khelvachauri (several months ago he was Gonio Community representative) DEC representative tried to convince me not to speak out loud about the above-mentioned conversation. One thing was obvious, however, and they did know who Anzor Malakmadze was
Now it was dinner time and representatives of the National Movement and the former and present “elite” of the Community laid out a table and invited me to have dinner with them. However, I refused their offer.

The police officers who were not in their uniforms and who stood outside the polling station were rather active. The presence of Oleg Putkaradze, head of Gonio Police Department and the representatives of Division of the MIA was also observed. The poling station # 37 was often visited by Gonio Community administration representatives and they spoke with the PEC chairperson outside the polling station.

When two PEC members and the observer of the Young Journalists Association returned from mobile voting at about 7 pm. The commission had finished the dinner break and election process continued. Several commission members were trying to stay close to the ballot box. This fact raised some suspicions and I tried to observe their movement most carefully. Suddenly, I saw that Merab Partenadze, the PEC member whose responsibility was to look after the ballot box stuffed several ballots into the box. I wrote the complaint. However, no one else was able to confirm my allegation. Moreover, the commission registered my complaint only after half an hour.  I was asked to withdraw my complaint numerous times before the commission had actually registered it. Even opposition party representatives asked me to do so.

The Precinct was closed at 8 pm. The counting process was observed by EU and Khelvachauri DEC representatives as well.

The PEC members became more aggressive towards me because they thought I asked international observers who came to observe the situation during the day to observe counting in this polling station. “You won’t get any job from Tarkhnishvili (head of Central Election Commission of Georgia)…What have you done… Shame on you… “

Simon Zakaradze, the observer from the National Movement wanted to observe the counting process. However, it was against the law.

There were 127 envelops in the mobile box. This is when there were only 63 signatures in the additional list for mobile voters. The DEC representative invalidated the mobile box results. The PEC chairperson and PEC members became tensed. They tried to refrain from abusing me but they were so angry about me they could not control their emotions. Murad Narakidze, the representative of the Khelvachauri DEC and member of the National Movement and Sinon Zakaradze, the National Movement observer could not hide their discontent and how the ballots of the mobile box were invalided.

Oleg Putkaradze, head of Gonio Police Department used foul language against “some girl” (me) who destroyed all their plans.

Meanwhile, Murad Narakidze received good information through mobile phone: in one of Sarpi Precincts National Movement took 780 votes out of 900. “Good work, well done...” said exited Narakidze.

In the end, the main box was opened. I was looking forward when the envelope with two ballot papers appeared. I did not have to wait for a long time. A counter tried to pass both ballots to another counter quickly so that no one noticed the fraud fact. However, I managed to notice it. In the end the envelope was invalidated. Finally, it turned out that this was not the only envelope with multiple ballot papers. A total of 16 envelopes were declared void. Some had 4, 6, 8, 10 and even 14 ballots.

According to the signatures registered in the general list there should have been 655 envelopes in the main box but there were only 433.

Khelvachauri DEC declared the results of Akhalsopeli Precinct # 37 void…

The elections were over and it is claimed by officials that the elections in Adjara Autonomous Republic were fair. I can only say that I saw violations at one specific polling station. I was unable to observe that situation at other polling stations. I do not know what may have happened there. Nothing would have happened where I was if no one had revealed and made a complaint about the voting violations.