On 1 October, Piotr Andryevich, former member of constituency election commission No. 8 and activist of the Belarusian Popular Front Party, submitted an appeal to the Prosecutor of Malaryta district urging the official to investigate election rigging allegations and recognize the voting results invalid.

The appeal argued that large amounts of voters in a number of local villages cast ballots at their residence. “The election papers say that the number of voters who made use of this type of voting ranged between 112 and 270 persons, i.e. in some cases the number reached half of the total amount of electors registered at the polling station. I believe that it is impossible to take the ballot box to over 200 voters in this short time,” says Mr. Andryevich.

The reported violations at Khatsislau polling station No. 81 are even more blatant. “The chair of the election commission failed to explain why the mobile boxes contained 181 ballots, while there were no lists of those who had cast their ballots. Taking into account the official data reported in the final record that claimed there were no voters who cast ballots at their residence, it looks like the ballots were stuffed in the box and counted at the polling station, which is an outrage against the Electoral Code,” says the former election official.

Piotr Andryevich voiced all the violations at the final sitting of the constituency election commission held on 24 September, calling on the commission to recognize the voting results invalid. However, the proposal was rejected. “I could not see any point in appealing the violations at the Central Election Commission, so I passed my statement to the Prosecutor of Malaryta district,” says Mr. Andryevich.