Dagestan Judge Says Officials Falsifying Elections in Almost Every Possible Way

 Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 5 -- Voting rights activists have long reported that Russian officials have regularly falsified elections in the North Caucasus to allow the region's leaders to report that Vladimir Putin and his allies have won 95 percent or more of the vote. But these reports have often been dismissed as anecdotal or because the activists supposedly have their own agendas.

    Now, in what is an almost unprecedented development, a judge in Dagestan has declared from the bench that officials in a local district there have engaged in all the kinds of falsifications that activists have  pointed to and his words have been reported in the local court record.

    Although Judge Musin's findings concern only one district in only one election, they deserve to be noted and remembered because Moscow or the regional government take them down because they are so damning.  Here is what he said:

"Some voters voted at several polling stations. There were cases of voting by citizens not registered in the Kaka-Shurinsky village council district. The number of ballots found in hte ballot boxes exceeded the number of ballots issued to voters. The procedure for tabulating the voting results was violated, including when drawing up the protocols on the voting results at all polling stations."

    Musin's statement can be found at karabudahkentskiy--dag.sudrf.ru/modules.php?name=sud_delo&srv_num=1&name_op=doc&number=138809890&delo_id=41&new=0&text_number=1; it has been reproduced at golosinfo.org/articles/153449 and echofm.online/stories/rossijskij-sud-priznal-chto-v-rossii-sistematicheski-falsificziruyut-vybory-no-poka-lish-na-primere-odnogo-dagestanskogo-sela..

    Following his declaration, the judge cancelled the election and ordred a new one in which different candidates took part.