Where have the votes gone? Kar queries

Main Stories, National
Source:

The National, Thursday July 19th, 2012

By DULCIE OREKE
THE People’s Progress Party is protesting over the shortage of 751 votes for its candidate Titus Philemon.
This was reportedly discovered during quality check currently underway.
General secretary Moses Kar, in a letter to Milne Bay provincial steering committee chairman Henry Bailasi, said: “We have been part of PNG’s history and we have always stood up to fair play and by the rules”.  
He said the PPP national executives “must raise our strong doubt at the way officials have allowed such errors to occur.”
He said they could accept human error which may result in 40 to 50 votes being misplaced, but 750 votes involving a particular candidate raised strong suspicions and doubts over the integrity of the counting process.
“Our concerns are heightened when our candidate, Mr Titus Philemon is the only serious challenger to the sitting member.”
Kar alleged that quality check for count 27 found 226 uncounted votes for Philemon in his tray.
“And again in count 30, 525 votes were in his tray but never counted,” he said.
Kar questioned how such large numbers of votes could go unnoticed, especially when doing the tallies.
He said the more worrisome question was where the 226 and 525 votes went to make the initial primary box counts balance.
“Who got these votes?” he asked.
“Every box counted must balance, the tally sheets need to add up. So who got the votes and how?
Kar said they wanted the issue addressed and answers in writing.