Dominican Republic to count general election votes manually

Sano Domingo.- The CentralElectoral Board (JCE) on Thursday approved a manual vote count of the municipaland congressional ballots, one week after bowing to pressure and agreeing to doso for the votes for president.

JCE president made the announcement after a meeting with sixpresidential candidates and various social organizations that had requested themanual tally. "We realize this will generate scheduling difficulties, andalso has logistical complications for the JCE, which now has to make a newprocess of education and adjustment, but we will do our best within thosedifficulties, to ensure that things are that way.”

He called on the candidates who requested the manual count tonow do their part, "once adhering to their legitimate claims" and tounderstand that the election is not just the Board’s responsibility. He saidthe parties must train their delegates and ensure that their supporters behave ina civil manner during the process.

"Similarly, we ask the population to understand thatthe promise we made to deliver the results in record time, due to thiscircumstance, cannot be fulfilled, therefore it’s not JCE’s fault, orresponsibility of the JCE of not providing the results in the time promised,"Rosario said.

He said the decision was made after receiving a report fromColombia ex-president Andrés Pastrana, who asked the JCE to hear the candidatesspecifically on that topic.

Calls for dialogue

Pastrana, who heads the Organization of American States(OAS) observer mission, met with the opposition presidential candidates on Thursdayand is set to meet with president Danilo Medina in the National Palace at 10:30am.He had recommended that the JCE meet with the opposition parties to deal withtheir doubts on the elections.