Counting of polls during the recent parliamentary elections. Some volunteers were arrested over malpractice in election
Four election volunteers were arrested for exhibiting suspicious behaviour during the just-concluded parliamentary elections, the National Electoral Commission(NEC)has said.
While announcing provisional results for women parliamentary seats – September 5, NEC officials only mentioned cases of malpractice, without revealing names.
“One of the cases included opening a ballot box to get out an identity card that a voter had dropped in the box alongside the ballot paper. This is malpractice,” Mbanda said.
The cases were spotted in Karongi and Rubavu districts of Western Province.
“Some were caught trying to steal votes, while others had partially sealed ballot boxes. We also had cases of volunteers who were caught removing ballot papers from the box.”
Charles Munyaneza, the Executive Secretary of NEC has told KT Press, that four cases are involved.
“One of them is at the police station while investigation is ongoing for three others who are still in their families,” Munyaneza said.
Meanwhile, the announced preliminary results include women selected from four provinces and city of Kigali, representing the mandatory constitution requirement of 30% of women at Rwanda parliament.
The City of Kigali is allocated two slots while the Northern Province has four slots.
The Western Province, the Southern Province and even the Eastern province are each allocated six slots as per the law regulating elections.
The list include largely new figures in parliament, but some members of the outgoing parliament who sought reelection in the category of women also feature on this list while others are totally new figures.
Nyirarukundo Ignacienne who was voted from Southern province and Mukarugwiza Annonciathe from Eastern province are part of the MPs that are coming back.
Moreover, in City of Kigali, Kanyange Phoebe, the leader of Parti Socialiste du Progres (PSP) was also elected after failure to make it to the senate in the last polls.
In other terms, most of leaders of political parties who did not have any other appointment by the time the elections were conducted, will now meet at the parliament.
