Kathmandu, September 20

The Election Commission today said that it was working to deploy more groups to accelerate vote counting in Province 2.

The polls panel said that it had currently mobilised 318 groups for vote counting in 135 local levels of eight districts.

EC Commissioner Narendra Dahal said that the election body had deployed 27 senior officials in the districts of Province 2 to facilitate local officials in vote counting. “We have also directed other officials deployed for micro-monitoring to facilitate vote counting,” said Commissioner Dahal.

According to Dahal, representatives of political parties have created obstructions in the vote counting process. He said that vote counting had halted even when the representative of one party went to the toilet. Someone goes to the toilet and does not return for hours, due to which EC staffers cannot continue vote counting, according to Dahal.

He said that much time had been wasted with representatives of political parties squabbling over petty issues. Dahal said that the election body has directed the officials concerned to increase teams to accelerate counting.

EC Spokesperson Nabaraj Dhakal said that result of elections of all local levels would come within five days if 10 additional groups were deployed.

“We will complete vote counting before Dashain vacation if counting goes smoothly,” said Dhakal. He said that the election body had deployed additional employees to accelerate vote counting.

Dhakal said that additional groups would start vote counting after forging consensus with political parties. The EC said it had mobilised 11 groups to count votes in Birgunj metropolis and the groups would increase if they were needed to speed up the counting.

He said vote counting had been going on smoothly in all 134 local units out of 136 local levels of Province 2. Vote counting of Hansapur Municipality of Dhanusa has been completed in which Rastriya Janata Party-Nepal won mayoral and deputy mayoral posts.

Ballots of Rajbiraj Municipality have not been counted, as election of Ward No15 of the municipality is scheduled for tomorrow.

The EC postponed elections of Ward No 15 for tomorrow after the death of the Ward chair candidate from Rastriya Janata Party-Nepal.