Africa-Press – Angola. The plenary of the Constitutional Court (TC) decides, this Thursday (8), in the guise of an Electoral Court, the validation or not of the final results of the General Elections of August 24, in response to the electoral dispute appeals filed by UNITA and HOUSE-CE.
According to a source at the TC, the presentation of the plenary’s conclusions on litigation is scheduled for today, at the end of the plenary session, whose legal deadline of 72 hours expires exactly this Thursday.
Yesterday, the plenary of the TC rejected the appeal, presented by the coalition of parties CASA-CE, on the minutes of National Tabulation of the General Elections of 24 August.
In the dispute, the political formation, which obtained 46,750 votes, equivalent to 0.75 percent of the total (it did not elect any deputy), claimed that the final results of the votes scrutinized and published by the National Electoral Commission (CNE) did not match those of the your parallel count.
In Judgment nº768/2022, yesterday, the TC underlines that the appellant pointed out, by way of example, “disagreement” verified in the votes obtained in the provinces of Huambo, Cuanza-Norte and Benguela, where the count made by the CNE attributed to him less votes that are due.
In this vein, he requested that the Court order a recount based on the pre-existing minutes, in order to ensure the election of CASA-CE deputies to the National Assembly.
As the applicant did not file a complaint with the CNE, the document states, the TC clarifies that, under the combined provisions of articles 181 of the Constitution of the Republic, 153 of the Organic Law on General Elections (LOEG) and 57 of the Law on Constitutional Process, in order for the electoral dispute to take place, there must be, in advance, a complaint with the entity in charge of organizing and conducting the electoral process at national level, where the content of the complaint addressed to the body itself, in this case, the CNE constitutes the object of consideration by this Court.
In the judgment, the Constitutional Court underlines that “even if the appellant had complied with this legal requirement, its claim would not succeed, insofar as it only presented evidence referring to the electoral district of Cuanza-Norte, having verified the votes contained in the summary minutes in accordance with for processing (272), 849 votes were counted in this province”.
In the report, the appellant asked the Constitutional Council to recount the votes based on the pre-existing minutes, in order to ensure the election of CASA-CE deputies to the National Assembly, in accordance with the will of the people expressed at the polls.
For this purpose, in compliance with the provisions of number 2 of article 159 of the Organic Law on General Elections and by Order of 2 September, the judge who is the presiding judge of the Constitutional Court notified the CNE to, within a period of 72 hours, decide on the appeal and offer the corresponding counter-claims.
Consequently, the National Electoral Commission presented the counter-allegations on the 5th of this month, invoking, in essence, that the present appeal, as configured by the appellant, concerns the results of the national tabulation of the General Elections, for which the appellant was obliged, by legal imperative (article 153 of the LOEG), to present a prior complaint to the CNE, before appealing contentiously to the Constitutional Court, which was not done.
The legislator establishes that only decisions handed down by the CNE regarding the national counting of votes can be appealed to the Constitutional Court, in accordance with the provisions of paragraph b of article 155 of the LOEG, considered the culmination of a process that begins in the vote.
The Judgment was signed by nine counselor judges, out of the 10 that make up the plenary.
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