Front for Change: Berkut riot police officers remove vote count protocols from constituency No. 132
The executive service, with the assistance of Berkut riot police officers, removed all original vote count protocols from constituency No. 132 (Pervomaisk, Mykolaiv region) in the early hours of Friday, the press service of the Front for Change Party has reported.
"Law enforcers obliged the head of the commission to open the safe, and removed the original protocols. People tried to prevent them from stealing the documents. People barricaded the doors, but Berkut police officers drove them out and started breaking through the crowd to the bus. They were kicking people and beating them with sticks. Police officers came to help them beat ordinary citizens and used tear gas," reads the statement.
At the same time, the people who were on duty in front of the building of the district election commission blocked the way of the bus, in which the protocols were loaded. According to the Front for Change, law enforcers were destroying the documents inside the bus.
Local media aired a video with Bekut police removing the protocols and being involved in a scuffle.
Interfax-Ukraine has not yet managed to get a comment from the police in connection with an incident in Pervomaisk.
On Friday, November 2, Mykolaiv District Administrative Court is to host a meeting to consider a complaint on the counting of votes in constituency No. 132.
According to the Central Election Commission, with all votes counted in the constituency, opposition candidate Arkadiy Kornatsky garnered 39.66% of the vote, while his opponent, Party of Regions member Vitaliy Travianko, took 34.09%.
However, the CEC later released new figures showing that Travianko had beaten Kornatsky in the elections. Kornatsky has the same percentage of votes, while Travianko collected 39.97% of the vote.
