It seems like a deliberate strategy to alter the election results
By Salvador Garcìa Soto
MEXICO, May 24, 2021, (EL UNIVERSAL).- As if these elections were missing something, in the midst of the violence of the narco that assassinates, kidnaps, and withdraws candidates, with the same old practices of promising and conditioning support for votes and with the constant interference from the Presidency of the Republic in the campaigns in order to try to favor the ruling party, the INE has now raised the alert for a “Training Manual” issued by the Morena party, in which it instructs its polling station representatives to commit two crimes before and during the voting on June 6.
First, in the document distributed by Morena and with which it instructs who will be its representatives at the voting tables, the Morena party of President López Obrador asks them to miscount the votes received by their coalition “Together We Will Make History” (along with the PT and PVEM political parties) because instead of explaining to them what the electoral law says about how votes are divided and distributed in coalitions and asking them to abide by it, it asks them to register up to three votes each time they cross the ballot through the three parties. votes instead of a single vote for the candidate of the coalition, and the rest as a split vote, as indicated by law. What Morena is asking its representatives is an illegal practice that would completely alter the actual result of the election, which represents fraud, in addition to causing confusion among voters.
This situation could even become a reason for canceling the election.
“How should we count the votes of the coalition (Juntos Haremos Historia) in the election calculation?”, Says the training material distributed by Morena among its polling station representatives, in the section “Election of Federal Representatives: Morena Coalition and other parties in your district ”. And right there it is instructed: “1. When the voter marks the three boxes that belong to our coalition on the ballot, the count will give 1 vote for the proposed candidate and 1 vote for each of the parties in the coalition ”. That is, the ruling party asks its representatives to register up to three or four votes in their favor where, legally, there is only one vote.
The General Law of Electoral Institutions and Processes (LGIPE) clearly states that the votes cast in favor of a coalition count as one vote for the corresponding candidacy, but are divided proportionally among the parties that have been crossed out on the ballot. In article 290, paragraph 2, states: “In the case of coalition parties, if more than one of the respective emblems appears crossed, one vote will be assigned to the candidate of the coalition, which must be recorded in the respective section of the tally sheet and corresponding computation ”. While, in another article, 311, they say how the votes should be distributed among the parties that have been crossed on the ballot. The district sum of such votes will be distributed equally among the parties that make up the coalition. If there is a fraction, the corresponding votes are assigned to the party with the highest vote ”.
That is, if the voter crosses a single party in a coalition, that vote only counts as 1 for the nominated candidate and one in favor of the party whose emblem was crossed; if the voter crosses two parties, it is only one vote for the common candidate and one vote divided between the two parties that were crossed; and if the voter crossed the three parties, there is still only one vote for the candidate and a single vote divided into three parts of the parties that were crossed. And so if the law is absolutely clear on how to count and distribute the votes for coalitions, why is Morena asking their representatives on election day to count more votes than the law says?
The issue is serious and worrisome because it could generate enormous confusion in the counting of the votes and would make a lot of noise when the district counts are made, which is the final official part to know how many votes and positions each party won, including those who are united in coalitions. If at that time Morena challenges, with its own minutes, the INE’s counts because its representatives counted the votes as they asked and not as the law says, are they going to allege fraud and say that the electoral advisers want to steal their right? To have a real overrepresentation and to achieve a large majority in the Chamber of Representatives? If that is the strategy, it is serious and anticipates post-election problems.
Because, in addition, the same “Training Manual” of the ruling party is asking its representatives to visit, before the election, the officers of the Board of Directors of each polling place, that is, to look for the elected citizens to carry out that function and meet with them before the voting, something that also totally violates the law because party representatives should not visit the officials of the Polling Station Board of Directors. Articles 260 and 261 of the LGIPE establish which are the functions of the party representatives, and these are limited to monitoring and observing the process on election day, so they cannot meet beforehand with the polling station officials because that it would violate the principles of certainty, legality, and impartiality, and could constitute an act of pressure or coercion against electoral officials.
So, mistraining your representatives with misinformation and asking them to miscount the votes for your coalition, in addition to asking them to pressure or seek out the Casilla Board of Director’s officials, seems like a deliberate strategy by Morena to alter the results of the next election, intending to disqualify not only the work of the INE and the citizens who organize the election, but also trying to obtain, by force, a qualified majority in the Chamber of Representatives, something that is president Manuel López Obrador’s priority, and if the counting of the votes in the coalition is not enough for the over-representation they want, then shout the well-known “fraud” speech against them and pretend to annul those electoral results that do not suit them. Will they really go as far as this in their ambition to maintain power and the legislative majority at whatever it takes and at any cost?
By Salvador Garcìa Soto
Source: El Universal
DISCLAIMER: The opinions expressed hereby are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Yucatan Times.
