Some results sheet for Saturday's Local Council Election and Women's Development Committee elections do not add up, the Elections Commission has stated.
Speaking at a press conference held on Tuesday, EC's President Ahmed Shareef Adam said discrepancies were identified in the results sheet of 18 ballot boxes, and that the boxes would be recounted. He noted that the final result of some boxes are not clear due to the way in which the the results sheets were prepared, and said there were issues in the tally of total number of votes, and invalid and valid votes.
EC attempted to recheck the issue by opening the sealed security envelopes containing the ballots in the presence of respective candidates on Tuesday. However, the attempts were canceled after unrest ensued when member of the opposition coalition and some senior officials from main-ruling Maldivian Democratic Party showed up outside EC's office.
Although both parties accuse each other of attempting to block EC's work, Shareef said allegations by both parties are unfounded.
Shareef said the commission did not decide to recount votes based on complaints received by either party and said the decision was made independently by the commission based on its own findings.
Shareef said the commission has received a total of 89 election-related complaints including 21 filed by political parties. Some of the complaints are regarding the highs number of invalid votes recorded in Saturday's vote, and requests to recount votes due to losses by small margins have also been received, said Shareef.
