Turkey’s Council of State rejects request for annulment of election board’s decision
Turkey’s Council of State (Danıştay) has rejected main opposition party CHP’s request for the Council to take action against the Supreme Election Council’s (SEC) unlawful decision to accept ‘unstamped ballot papers and envelopes’ as valid in referendum held on April 16th for the extension of power of the presidency’s office in the country.
According to reports of Aysun Torun from HaberTürk TV, Council of State decided that the decision of SEC ‘did not require any administrative proceeding.’
SEC also had announced earlier yesterday that it ‘did not have to wait for a decision from Council of State before officially disclosing the referendum results.’
Both legal efforts of politicians of the opposition, as well as, civil demonstrations of the public continue against the scandalous decision of SEC, which had taken a last minute decision on the day of the polling to accept unstamped polling materials as valid despite that fact that it had sent messages to polling clerks in the early morning of the same day to remind them that ‘it was unlawful to render unstamped ballots and envelopes as valid.’
The narrow win of the ‘yes’ votes (by 51.4%) is still contested in the country and the opposition has repeatedly expressed determination to seek justice in the face of this fraud where over 2 million ballot papers are estimated to have been rendered unlawfully.