Left-wing parties Ecolo, the Socialist Party (PS) and Team Fouad Ahidar have filed a complaint about electoral fraud in the Brussels municipality Saint-Josse-ten-Noode.
List leaders from the three parties have filed an appeal with the jurisdictional college responsible for monitoring elections as well as a complaint to the Brussels Public Prosecutor's Office for electoral fraud, La Dernière Heure reported on Saturday.
Ahmed Mouhssin (Ecolo), Philippe Boïketé (PS) and Ibrahim Dankus (Team Fouad Ahidar) say they have noted "errors that should lead to invalidations". They accuse mayor Emir Kir's Liste du Bourgmestre of having manipulated proxy votes.
"There are some seats just floating around," they stated. "Without these irregularities, our respective lists could perhaps have had one more seat."
'The result is clear'
Kir has responded that "the result is clear and the difference in votes is more than marked. The vote took place without a hitch and we are once again back to spinning stories."
On 13 October, the outgoing mayor won an absolute majority in Saint-Josse, with 50.5% of the vote and 17 seats out of 29.
PS finished in second place (19.9%, six seats), ahead of Ecolo-Groen (15.5%, four seats). The Engagés-CD&V-MR list obtained 9% and two seats. With 5.1%, Team Fouad Ahidar did not enter the municipal council.
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Illegal proxy voting is currently under investigation in Ninove and nine other Belgian municipalities.
In Ninove, where the far-right party Vlaams Belang obtained an absolute majority for the first time ever, residents were explicitly asked by Vlaams Belang to cast a proxy vote ahead of the election. While proxy voting is not illegal, requests from a political party to do so are.
