Miguel Polo Polo announces judicial measures to recover the Afro seatpost

The former Colombian congressional candidate, Miguel Polo Polo, rejected inconsistencies in the process of scrutiny in the legislative elections, especially in the Afro-descendant special constituency, in which he lost his seat with candidate Lina Martínez García, daughter of the controversial former congressman, Juan Carlos Martínez Sinisterra, convicted of parapolitics and electoral fraud.

The former Democratic Center militant, who had denounced last Friday “the greatest fraud in history” and had requested a recount, after the appearance of 1,500 votes for his contender during the consolidated count by the National Registry of Civil Status, announced a legal fight to “recover” the Afro seat.

“We reject all the inconsistencies recorded in the last few hours during the process of counting votes in the Afro House nationwide and especially in the Pacific region, where we obviously face parapolitical, corrupt 'white collar' clans and electoral mafiosi; and others, who have become accustomed for years to manipulate the Afro seat at its convenience, promoting victimhood, resentment and social hatred to continue to enslave us,” said the aspirant to the House of Representatives.

Likewise, the political activist, who presented himself to the Community Council of Black Communities Fernando Ríos Hidalgo, indicated that he was “raising his voice” against senior officials of the Registry Office, indicating that citizens expect answers to the multiple inconsistencies between the E-14 and E-24 formats, as well as the delay in announce the official information of the new configuration of the Congress.

At the same time, he used the same argument of the governing party, in which he was active and maintained close to some of the most recognized parliamentarians, in the request for a recount of votes and the invitation that “the election of any candidate should not be declared until a total recount is made”, noting that historically it has been presented a difference of only 0.5 per cent between pre-counting and counting, as opposed to these elections in which discrepancies are close to 7 per cent.

“And practically all that percentage was for a political community in which its representative met in Spain with Indra, a company in charge of the Software that was going to total our votes,” said the former candidate.

In that sense, he assured that he would not allow himself to “steal the seat”, assuring that he would work consistently to “defeat those political mafias” of which he assured were not expected to vote so high, that with 99.41% of the tables counted, he had reached 35,253 votes, however, they were not enough to reach the seat that he had counted was handed over to the candidate by the Community Council of the Black Communities Limones.

“This place belongs to everyone, it belongs to everyone who put their vote in the ballot box, blacks, whites, mestizos, Indians; we are all one Colombia and we are this Afro place that I have won. We ask for your support, we need volunteer lawyers throughout the country, especially in the Pacific zone, who want to join this citizen force to protect and take care of our votes cast on March 13 at the polls, the more we are less cheating they can cheat us,” Polo Polo concluded.

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