Have not filed election related issues in court, issues being reviewed: JP

Jumhoory Party has stated that they have yet to file any election related cases in court, and that they are currently looking into the issues.

Jumhoory Party candidate Gasim Ibrahim ended up in third place with 50,422 votes (24.07 percent) in the presidential polls last Saturday, close behind Progressive Party of Maldives (PPM) candidate Abdulla Yameen who received 53,099 votes (25.35 percent). Securing second place, Yameen will compete with Maldivian Democratic Party candidate Mohamed Nasheed in the run-off.

JP candidate’s spokesperson Ibrahim Khaleel told “Sun” today that the party did submit complaints to the Elections Commission before the polling day but said that the issues were not addressed and that they consequently arose during polling.

“We highlighted certain issues before the elections, that there might be repeated voting, that there are registration related issues, we brought so many such issues to the attention of the Elections Commission. Then we realized that these issues happened during the election. So we are currently checking the issues,” Khaleel said.

He also said that JP has not yet filed any election related case with the court and that if they decide to file a case, they would do so after carefully reviewing the issues.

Khaleel also refuted recent rumors that JP is speaking to other political parties about the possibility of forming a coalition. He said that the Progressive Party of Maldives (PPM) and the Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) had both asked them to sit down for talks to form a coalition, but said that they have not yet held such a discussion within the party. He also said that all rumors that JP candidate Gasim Ibrahim was feeling ill was also not true.

JP supporters held a protest on the night of polling day, claiming that the poll was rigged. They accused that 10,000 votes had been cast illegally.