27729: Fwd: Math Jay:(commentary) Decret electoral. A new controversy (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Jepiem@aol.com


In some other circles, there is now a starting controversy over the formula
the electoral council is going to use or is using to calculate the final
percentage of votes obtained by each candidate. Intuition would tell us that
the

simple formula of dividing the number of votes obtained by a candidate and
dividing that by the total number of aknowledged voters for all the candidates

and multiplying that by a hundred would give the number of votes obtained by
each candidate. Don't let your intuition fool you. The electoral decree
supposedly or at least by law prepared by the Council and approved and
promulgated
by the de facto executive government says the following:
 "Article 87: Le President de la Repuablique est elu a majorite  absolue des
votes valides plus une voix"......
"Article 185: Sont valides et comptabilises, les bulletins de votes marques
d'une croix, d'un "X" ou de tout autre signe indiquant de facon non equivoque,
 l'intention de l'electeur de voter dans l'espace (cercle, photo, embleme)
reserve au candidat.
" Sont aussi valides et comptabilises les bulletins ne comportant aucun
choix.
" Sont declares nuls les bulleting ne compartant aucun choix."
Read the last paragraphes of article 185 very carefully. To me there is an
obvious contratiction there. If ballots without any choice of candidate are
considered null and void, that is invalid, how can one with no choice of
candidate at all indicate the intent of the voter?
Some will say that a ballot without a choice means the candidate elected to
vote for no canditate at all and therefore this is an intent. I have some
problems with this interpretation.
Problem #1 ( and I may hurt certain sensitivities here) We are dealing with
a majority illiterate and not very sophisticate electorate whose only  concern
seems to be to vote in a candidate and not to bother with such
sophistication in the matter of making sure their candidate gets elected and
particularly
in the haitian context that some other candidate doesn't get  elected. I would
even say that in the haitian context this is an elitist  interpretation or
may be an elitist assumption on the part of those who wrote  the article.
Problem #2 Considering the difficulty the population had to get to the
poles, with stations opening three or four hours behind the scheduled time,
getting to the polling staiton and finding that their names were not on the
registry, and some voters having to travel miles over mountains and to cross
rivers
to get to those stations, I find it hard to believe that so many voters  would
want to go and just put in a blank vote.
This will probally be a subject for recriminations on the part of some
dissatisfied candidates and I find that they would have a valid point. Any
problems or dire consequences resulting from such deficiencies should be
placed

right at the doorstep of the de facto government and the electoral council who

have been so quick on patting themselves on the back for the so called success

of the elections. The people did cooperate and could have been some successful
 elections, but along the way someone dropped the ball not just once, but
several  times. As they say you made your bed so lie in it. Unfortunately if
there are  ill consequences from those deficiencies and if the government and
the
council  don't aknowledge their faults and manage the consequences well, there
may be a  lot of dead innocent people lying with them in that  bed.