Paragraph 48

 

An amendment creating a new Article 170.3 provides:

 

170.3. If voting in a single mandate election constituency is considered invalid due to the miscount of ballot papers, the Central Election Commission shall make a decision on recount of votes. In such a case, the recount shall be provided by the relevant constituency election commission in a manner determined by the Central Election Commission.

 

It is not clear how this article could be applied in an election. Under existing Article 170.2, an election in a constituency is invalid in three situations: (1) violations of law during voting or counting “that make it impossible to determine the voters’ will”; (2) cancellation of voting results exceeds 2/5ths of the number of precincts in the constituency and the number of registered voters in the precincts exceed 1/4th of voters registered in the constituency; and (3) on the basis of a court decision. The new Article 170.3 requires a recount “if voting in a single mandate election constituency is considered invalid due the miscount of ballot papers”. However, a miscount of ballot papers is not a ground in Article 170.2 for invalidation. Thus, it would not appear that there would ever be a legal basis for requiring a recount since a miscount of ballots is not a ground for invalidation under Article 170.2. Although the amendment appears to attempt to address a previous recommendation that a recount of ballots should be taken before results are invalidated, application of the amendment in an election would be difficult due to the grounds for invalidation stated in Article 170.2. The issue of recount is an important one that has previously been raised as efforts to recount ballots should be taken before election results are invalidated. As the application of Article 170.3 is prevented by the existing text of Article 170.2, the recommendation remains unaddressed.