10 November 2010

One Step Back and.........Another Step Back

A recent report in the Kyiv Post tells us about Brian Mefford who acted as an election observer in the city of Odessa on election day 31st October 2010.
Read what he says.......

"During Ukraine’s Oct. 31 local elections, I served as an international election observer on behalf of the Committee for Open Democracy The Committe for Open Democracy was the largest accredited observation mission from abroad with 96 observers from 14 countries.We focused our efforts on Odesa (Odessa) due to its history of problematic and competitive elections.

For example, the 2002 election results there were later overturned by the courts due to fraud and use of administrative resources. Our official statement criticized the intentionally slow vote counting process, hostility to some international observers, use of administrative resources, and wide scale use of technical parties (parties that exist only on paper) to staff commissions.Simply put, the Odesa election was a setback for democracy and free elections in Ukraine.The oldest and largest domestic observation organization, the Committee of Voters of Ukraine, characterized the Odesa election as “chaotic” and resembling “the 2004 presidential election.” They added that the Odesa election “represents a big step backwards.”

Well there you go again in Odesa Ukraine.

See the full article here:

No comments: