“There are no reasons to find the election at the Homel-Savetskaya election constituency #34 invalid”, this is the answer received by a former candidate for the Parliament Ihar Sluchak.

Earlier he addressed the constituency election commission and the Central Election Commission with a requirement to hold a repeated calculation of votes. He referred to information of numerous observers who stated that the real turnout at the polling stations of the Savetskaya constituency did not exceed 35-36% of the electorate, whereas the official ratio is 69%.

The Central Election Commission replied by a governmental telegram telling him that the appeal would be considered at the 5 October sitting.

“The answer of the constituency election commission was predictable, but it was necessary to make the inquiry in order to register the violation of the electoral legislation juridically, as such things have no time limitation. I have no illusions that the CEC will find the election invalid at my constituency, but the decision about the repeated calculation of the votes could be a sign of good will which would be positively treated by the international community. The last such case happened in the Homel region in 1996,” commented Mr. Sluchak.

“Human Rights Defenders for Free Elections”