Botswana Football Association (BFA) Elections Appeals Committee is allegedly in receipt of an appeal against the recent association elections.
The appeal, which is alleged to have been launched by Senki Sesinyi, was received by the BFA on the 13th of October.
Sesinyi had contested for the position of BFA 2nd Vice president in the just ended elections under the Team Sebego ticket.
According to the appeal letter, which Sunday Standard has seen, Sesinyi’s bone of contention is that ‘the electoral process was not properly followed’ during the elections.
Sesinyi, who says he is seeking for ‘fresh elections for all candidates,’ noted there was a number of irregularities ‘that occurred particularly at Jwaneng,’ where he was based.
Among these, Sesinyi says article 16 of the BFA electoral code, which speaks to the colour of ballot papers was not followed.
The article states that “The ballot paper shall be of a different colour for each round of elections.”
Sesinyi contends that there was no variation of colours used in the first round of elections as well as in the re-run.
His other complaint is on the role played by the BFA secretariat employees in the vote count.
Article 20 of the BFA Electoral Code states that ‘Only members of the electoral committee may take part in the count, with all other operations, opening the urn, counting the ballot papers, counting votes etc … shall be carried out in a way that can be followed clearly by the members of the general assembly.’
Sesinyi’s contention is that one of the BFA Secretariat employees, who is not a member of the Electoral Committee,’ had actively taken part in the votes count, including opening the urn. He said this was in contravention of the BFA electoral code.
On another issue, Sesinyi is also casting aspersions on the secrecy of the BFA ballot. He says the while the BFA constitution calls for secret ballot, ‘social media posts and subsequent advertisements show that the elections were not secretive.’
He says this contravenes Article 26.1 of the BFA constitution which states that ‘elections shall be conducted by secret ballot.’
Still with the elections, Sesinyi said there were also allegations of bribery making rounds on the day of the elections, something which he says could have impacted on the outcome of the elections.
