Tea Topuria
Ganmukhuri is a beautiful village located close to the administrative border with Abkhazia. Although the municipal elections were more or less calm in Samegrelo region, there was noise and disorder in Ganmukhuri village from the early morning on May 30.
I was an observer at the polling station # 38 in Ganmukhuri village. As soon as I arrived at the PS, I discovered two booths instead three. There were no instructions who to fill in ballot papers in the booths. There was no special list, though 44 people were on the list of portable ballot box. The elections started with the phrase: “Why does he need an ID? We all know that he lives in Ganmukhuri…” “We know him, he lives in Ganmukhuri.”
My protest caused first astonishment; I said people could not vote without ID. Commission members told me the person forgot the ID and they could not send him back home.
Afterwards, we heard the same dialogues all day long: “How am I assisting the voter?! Is it assistance if I give him glasses in the booth?” “I will register you, granny, but the observer does not allow us.” Only at 12:00 pm, the registrars realized that an IDP had to produce both ID and IDP certificate. However, it did not hinder IDP Giorgi Kavtaradze to vote.
Ganmukhuri village deputy governor Tengiz Shengelia accompanied 92-year-old Kavtaradze to the booth and shouted loudly. “This man has arrived from Abkhazia; he does not have passport and register him without any problems!” “The observer does not allow us to!” the commission members complained and Shengelia made a long statement. He said I do not understand what Abkhazia is and how difficult it is to cross the administrative border. Commission members agreed him. “Of course, he should vote because he is an old man and poet. We will let him to vote.”
The situation got even more complicated by afternoon. Todua – a person responsible to mark people -was sitting on the window-sill with the marking apparatus and did not get down unless we called him. In general, everybody was holding the marking apparatus all day long – registrar, commission chairperson and observer from the ruling party. We had guests time by time. Village deputy governor, other representatives of the village council and policemen did not leave us all day long. Shengelia was the most active; he and other officials were leading commission chairperson and commission members out of the PS and whispered or shouted something to them – “they do not have right;” “why do you give so many rights to the observers;” “throw them away from here.” “She is impolite and nothing more; they do not respect old people. Should we have sent such an old man back home to get passport?”
In the afternoon we discovered that the portable ballot box, after it was returned to the polling station, was left unsealed for two hours. Commission chairman Mamuka Sajaia got surprised when we protested: “Why does it need to be sealed? I do not have its seal at all.” After I started to write a complaint, a commission member decided to write a complaint on me. “If we have breached anything, why did not you notice it at once? Did you notice it only two hours later?!”
There were some other incidents. A man over 70, whom we sent back to bring ID, soon returned with the ID of another person. The old man was insisting that about 40-year-old man on the photo was he. Neither registrar “noticed” the age difference between them not to speak about different names and ID numbers.
Broken Ballot Boxes
Finally, the polling station was closed at 8:00 pm. However, it was not so easy to close the PS; because the door did not have a lock and we had to hold it by hand. Anyway, nobody cared about it. The door was left open and everybody could enter the PS easily.
After “closing” the polling station, the commission members managed to carry out only two procedures. Two observers (one of them was I) and counters were elected based on the ballot. However, the chairman decided that observers had to stay 2 meters away from the ballot box. Until I tried to convince them that in accordance to the law I had to stand at the table, a commission member Emzar Akhalaia (from the initiative group) started shouting and broke both boxes and threw ballot papers on the table. After that, the situation became completely uncontrolled at the PS. 8 people started to count ballot papers instead elected three. By that time the registration seals were not locked yet; spoilt ballot papers and other documents, which shall be sealed before the boxes are opened, were not sealed at all. As a result of the counting, the National Movement gained most votes.
District Election Commission Did not Satisfy the Complaint
Despite so many violations observed, the district election commission # 67 did not satisfy the complaint of the Human Rights Center to annul the election results at the PS. In parallel to it, commission member Zviad Akhalaia was oppressed who wrote in the final protocol that elections were carried out illegally and did not agree with the results. Tengiz Shengelia, village commissary Joni Meshvelia and single mandate candidate from the Ganmukhuri village Joni Sajaia were calling him on the phone and threatening on the phone.
The Human Rights Center will appeal to the court against the decision of the district election commission
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