3 February 2010 05:30 am
Former Common opposition Presidential Candidate General Sarath Fonseka lodged a complaint with the Elections Commissioner this morning alleging malpractices at the just concluded Presidential elections.
The letter submitted by the candidate highlights the issues regarding election malpractices and the discovery of burnt polling cards.
“The differences in numbers seen at the counting centers and those that were received in Colombo are a major concern,” Secretary to the opposition candidate Dr. Seneka De Silva told Daily Mirror Online.
The letter requests that copies of the certified results sheets from the Elections Counters, prepared according to the regulations of the Presidential Elections Act of 1981 section 15 subsection 59, should be submitted to the candidate at the earliest possible date. These results should be the postal voting and voting results from the 22 districts. The candidate requests these for the use in the petitions he intends to forward to nullify the election results.
The documents forwarded to the Elections Commissioner Dayananda Dissanayaka stated that according to information received the results received by the Commissioner are not those that were sent to him by the counters at the respective counting centers.
The letter further accuses the Senior Presidential Advisor and MP Basil Rajapaksa of being at the Elections Commission on the 27th of January and presenting to the Elections Commissioner tampered results.
The letter concedes that the Commissioner had presented the results despite the requests by the opposition to nullify them due to their inaccuracy, due to the pressure he was facing.