One Surrey’s keen supporters who headed to the advance civic election polling stations on Saturday might have noticed something off with the ballot list as two candidates were not identified under the party name.
City councillor candidates Maz Artang and Mike Bose are running under the banner of mayoral candidate Barinder Rasode’s One Surrey party. However, throughout the first two hours of advance voting, their names on the ballot list were not affiliated with One Surrey.
Election officials halted advance voting at three stations for a period of an hour to resolve the issue. New ballots that include the party name were promptly printed.
A spokesperson with the One Surrey says the error was made by the municipality’s election officers, who have conceded their fault to making the mistake. But given the potential impact the error has to the election results, the party is not satisfied with the response and will seek legal advice on the matter.
“It’s very unfortunate error which caused a lot of voter confusion for people going into the ballot box looking for seven One Surrey candidates and only seeing five,” Barinder Rasode told Vancity Buzz.
“Hundreds, potentially thousands of ballots were affected, and our legal advisors say the error is unprecedented. Having an incorrect ballot is a big problem and the integrity of the voting process is now being questioned.”
Feature Image: One Surrey