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Defeated WCRFA presidential candidate challenge election result

Jul 5, 2017, 2:48 PM | Article By: Fatou B. Cham & Lamin Darboe

The defeated West Coast Regional Football Association presidential candidate Lamin Jarjue has challenged the result of the West Coast Regional Football Association presidential election.

Jajue was defeated by incumbent Abdoukarim Sey in West Coast Regional Football Association presidential election held at the Governor’s Office in Brikama on 30 March 2017.

Jarjue said the convening of the election congress was not in line with the article 29 of the Constitution of the West Coast Regional Football Association (WCRFA), which provides that the Election shall be by an electoral committee which shall be elected by the General Assembly one year before the elections in compliance with GFF election code.

He stated members of the electoral committee that conducted the election of the said congress were not elected in accordance with article 29.

Jarjue further stated that 28 days’ notice as mandated by the West Coast Regional Football Association constitution under article 24.

“1 was also not observed and as a result, most of the stakeholders receive their notice letter very late,” he said.

Another serious constitutional violation was the denial of voting rights to delegates from teams which were view as hostile voters towards the incumbent candidate, Jarjue pointed out.

He revealed that delegates had the written authority and expressed right from their teams to vote and be voted for on the day of the election.

He further revealed that the delegates were allowed to exercise their constitutional rights protected under article 22.3 of the West Coast Regional Football Association constitution.

Jarjue lamented that there was clear evidence of undue influence and abuse of office when privileged information was disclosed by the administrative officer who persistently made phone calls to various stakeholders and insisted on divulging names of their delegates and particular the delegates with voting rights.

He further lamented that it was evident that administrative officer gave names of delegates with voting rights to the campaign team of the incumbent with a view to solicit votes from them.

Jarjue pointed out that this elective congress witnessed fraud, adding that certain delegates who cast their votes on that day were in fact not on the delegates list.

Jarjue called on the chairman of National Sports Council to investigate and take appropriate actions about the result of the West Coast Regional Football Association presidential election held in March 2017.