Armenian Constitutional Court rules MP elected

 The Armenian Constitutional Court has ruled that independent
candidate Samvel Avetisyan was duly elected MP at the 30th May
parliament polls, despite an early electoral commission ruling
that there had been too many inaccuracies in the electoral
rolls to validate the poll in constituency 15. The following is
the text of the report by the Armenian news agency Noyan Tapan
on 29th June//

Yerevan, 28th June: On 28th June, the Armenian Constitutional
Court continued examining the petition by the parliamentary
candidate for the National Assembly in electoral precinct 15 of
Yerevan, Samvel Avetisyan (independent, chairman of the Rafayel
cooperative society). Avetisyan disputes the decision of the
Yerevan Regional Electoral Commission invalidating the polls
under the first-past-the-post system in this precinct.
According to the Central Electoral Commission [CEC], the
difference between the number of votes gained by the candidates
who took the first two places, Samvel Avetisyan (2,134 votes)
and Vladik Abramyan (2,014 votes), amounted to 120 only,
whereas there are 203 inaccuracies, which could have had a
significant impact on the election results.

The meeting of the Constitutional Court was adjourned on
21st June, since the Constitutional Court had asked the
Armenian Prosecutor-General's Office to verify the electoral
documents in this precinct. In particular, protocols of the
same name, which however contained contradictory figures, in
precinct 15 were to be verified.

Based on the data of the check by the prosecutor's office,
and summing up the results of the examination of the case by
the Constitutional Court, the Constitutional Court established
that the overall number of cancelled ballot papers in this
electoral precinct totalled not 714 (as the CEC said), but 835,
and the number of inaccuracies totalled not 117, but four. The
overall number of inaccuracies in precinct 15 totalled not 203,
but 90, which is less than the difference between the votes
gained by the candidates who got the most votes. During the
hearings, the Constitutional Court also found out that there
were no other well-founded reasons for deeming invalid the
polls in precinct 15 of Yerevan under the first-past-the-post
system.

The Constitutional Court decided to meet the demand of the
candidate from this precinct, Samvel Avetisyan, and to deem
redundant the decision of the Yerevan Regional Electoral
Commission on the elections in precinct 15. The Constitutional
Court recognized Samvel Avetisyan as an MP of the National
Assembly. The decision takes effect the moment it is published,
and is not subject to review.

Source: Noyan Tapan news agency, Yerevan, in Russian 0500 gmt 29 Jun 99
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