Mr. Dampha, when votes are counted and no recount is requested from political parties, the Returning Officer RO(responsible for the Division), Asst. Returning Officer ARO(responsible for the constituency), Counting Agents from various political parties and observers will all add up the votes counted using their own adding machines or heads. As soon as the RO and the ARO are ready adding up the results, they will announce it and each Counting Agent will also verified and announce the results they have. If all the numbers are the same and the math is accurate, the RO will certify the result and Counting Agents sign at the back that they have witnessed the counts.

The certified result will be fax to the IEC office for further verifications by a team of experts. This team during the last Referendum, Presidential and National Assembly elections was headed by Denise Cox, Logistic Adviser to the PIEC from UK and was assisted by others like Adebola(Senior Logistic Officer) Prempey ( Logistic Officer), one Barbara (European national)a communication officer and a British national who was an expert on information system. They look for math errors, verify signatures on the faxed result sheets and also make sure the results sheet tally accurately.

When they are satisfied with the result, it will be given to the Chairman for endorsement and announced over the air.

Now, why Gamtel was involve? Fax experts from Gamtel were sent to every administrative area to take care of any mechanical problems with the faxes and also help us use the fax machine properly. We were faxing in PIEC Divisional offices. Gamtel officials were not allowed to fax for us. I did all my own faxes, kept the original copies of  the results and make another copy for the Gamtel officer. We both hide our copies at different places.

 

Shortly before the Presidential election, we were alerted of the Mali Experience where faxed results were re-routed to State House instead of the electoral Headquarters. Denise Cox asked every Returning Officer and Asst. Returning Officers to hand deliver a copy of their signatures to him for verification purpose. I don't know whether the results were re-routed to State House or not or whether Pa Roberts was sitting at State House or PIEC Headquarters but i know for sure that the votes i counted in Janjanbureh were the ones pronounced over the ratio and TV. No difference. I will refrain myself from mentioning anything against Pa Roberts, but i know Bishop Johnson is a very strong man and he would not compromise the ethics of his duty with PIEC. His removal is very regretful

Cheers

Lamin PF Manneh