Election Committee rejects complaint concerning referendum incident

Budapest, February 26 (MTI) – The National Election Committee has turned down an appeal by Socialist MP Zoltán Lukács for an investigation into an incident on Tuesday, in which a group of thugs prevented Socialists from submitting a referendum initiative.

At a session on Friday, the committee turned down the appeal saying that Lukács had not accurately defined the violation he was complaining about and that Lukács had given an address different from the one in the official registry.

Lukács corrected the address and indicated the legal stipulations which had been violated in the incident, but committee head András Patyi said it was not possible to amend such appeals.

Patyi said his committee would evaluate circumstances under which the Socialists attempted to submit their initiative and would look at the footage recorded by the National Election Office’s cameras on Tuesday morning. He added that “equality between voters would be harmed if appeals with formal deficiencies were accepted” because it would mean that irregular appeals by other people should also be accepted.