Sao Tome: Constitutional court orders presidential election recount

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Sao Tome: Constitutional court orders presidential election recount

12:50 CAT | 26 Jul 2021

File photo: Lusa

The Constitutional Court (TC) of São Tomé and Príncipe has ordered a “full recount of the votes” in the presidential elections held on 18 September, upholding the appeal lodged by candidate Delfim Neves, according to a ruling available to Lusa today.

Delfim Neves, also speaker of parliament, was declared the third most voted candidate in the ballot of 18 July, with 16.88% of the votes (13,691 votes), according to provisional results issued by the National Electoral Commission (CEN), and was excluded from the second round, which Carlos Vila Nova and Guilherme Posser da Costa agreed to.

The candidate denounced what he considered to be “several irregularities” in the electoral act, including the disappearance of about 4,500 votes cast in the ballot boxes, as announced last week in a press conference by his campaign director, João Costa Alegre.

Delfim Neves has filed an appeal with the Constitutional Court requesting a “total recount of the votes” or that “the nullity of the electoral act should be declared”.

The ruling, dated 23 July and distributed to the press today, was rejected by two of the five judges, with the president, Pascoal Daio, using his casting vote to end the tie-breaker.

The ruling bears the signatures of Pascoal Daio, who was Delfim Neves’ lawyer, and Hilário Garrido, the candidate’s brother-in-law.

Judges Maria Alice Vera Cruz Carvalho and Amaro Pereira de Couto did not sign the judgment with a “dissenting vote” in front of their names. At the same time, Jesuley Novais Lopes was “unavailable”.

The second most voted candidate’s request for a recount of the votes was also advocated in these presidential elections.

Guilherme Posser da Costa, who obtained 16,829 votes, equivalent to 20.75%, considered that “because of the doubts that remain”, the recount of the votes will “completely” clarify “things”.

The candidate supported in these elections by his party, the Movement for the Liberation of São Tomé and Príncipe – Social Democratic Party (MLSTP-PSD), the main party of Jorge Bom Jesus’ government, stressed that he did not want to “go to a second round with any suspicion”.

“I would not feel comforted, being in a second round with suspicions of the results having been rigged by one or the other candidacy, or whoever,” he commented last week.

Maria das Neves, another candidate from the MLSTP, who ran in the presidential race for the third time, also called for a recount in a message she posted on her Facebook page.

Contacted by Lusa, the candidacy of the winner of the first round, Carlos Vila Nova, postponed a reaction until today.

Vila Nova, a former minister in Patrice Trovoada’s government (2014-2018) and officially supported by the opposition Independent Democratic Action (ADI) was the winner of the first round, with 39.47% of the votes (32,022 votes), according to provisional data from the National Electoral Commission.

A total of 19 candidates ran in São Tomé and Príncipe’s presidential elections on 18 October, seeking to succeed Evaristo Carvalho, who did not stand for a second term in the People’s Palace.

Source: Lusa