[EL] French vote-counting dispute

[Douglas Carver]

I have a friend who works campaigns in France (on the Left -- she
things the discombulation on the right is quite funny). I posed your
question to her, and she told me that her understanding was that the
parties sort out such controversies themselves, but she is asking
around to get more details -- specifically, whether the courts ever
get involved.

Douglas Carver
Albuquerque, NM

On Tue, Nov 20, 2012 at 7:40 AM, Lillie Coney <coney at lillieconey.net> wrote:
> Hello Edward, I work with a couple of International civil society projects.
> I asked a contact in
> France for their take on what is happening on the conservative opposition
> party and vote counting.  Their message follows:
>
> Now the re-counting process is achieved, and the result is Jean-François
> Copé: 50.03% and François Fillon 49.97% (difference: 98 votes). The body
> responsible for the re-counting is an internal body, called COCOE
> (Commission for organization and control of electoral operations), but the
> initial (disputed) counting was made in an usual manner, in each voting
> bureau throughout the country.
> There have been many, many irregularities, e.g. approx 1000 voting bulletins
> found in a bureau while there was only approx 500 voters signatures...
> Not, given the results which are very close (though not disputed anymore),
> Copé is elected (and recognized as winner by Fillon) and the political
> suspense is still there: will they both discuss an agreement for a
> co-direction or something similar? It seems unlikely, since Fillon just
> declared that "there is a moral and political fracture" in the party. (well,
> he's now focusing on Paris Mayor election in 2014 and probably next
> presidential elections in 2017).
> The National Front (Le Pen's extreme right wing) is of course very happy of
> such a shameful process (good for them), and so is the center-right
> (expecting to gain members among the UMP members disappointed with the 'hard
> line' of the winner).
>
> I would add that there have been some interesting issues with public
> elections in developed democracies that are notable.  Another issue was the
> robo calls during the most recent Canadian Ridings that represented that
> they were from Elections Canada and redirected voters to the wrong polling
> locations.  It is under investigation by Canada's Chief Privacy
> Commissioner.
>
> I hope this helps, let me know if you need anything else.
>
> Lillie
>
> On Nov 19, 2012, at 8:32 AM, Foley, Edward wrote:
>
> The media is reporting this morning that France’s conservative opposition
> party has become mired in a vote-counting dispute over the selection of the
> party’s new leader.
>
> What I’m able to gather is that the “electorate” is rather small: about
> 300,000 party members entitled to vote (of whom only about 60% cast
> ballots), with the current count separating the two candidates by about 200
> votes or so.  Both sides apparently claim “irregularities” with some news
> stories referring  to allegations of “fraud”.
>
> Most interestingly (from my perspective), there is apparently a “commission”
> with jurisdiction to supervise the vote-counting and resolve the dispute.
> Some news stories describe the commission as “independent,” but this Wall
> Street Journal report describes it as a “party
> commission”:http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323353204578128571621869016.html
>
> I’m curious to learn more about the status and composition of this
> commission—and whether this dispute will serve as a test of the ability to a
> commission to handle a dispute of this nature.  (For several years now, I
> have thought that France might be the most interesting and relevant
> comparison to the United States in terms of institutions and procedures to
> handle vote-counting disputes, because it has more of a presidential system
> than the English-speaking parliamentary systems with which the U.S. is often
> compared—Canada, Australia, Britain, etc.)
>
> Do any members of this listserv have particular knowledge of French election
> law and could address the nature of the commission that has jurisdiction
> over this particular intra-party electoral dispute?
>
> Thanks, Ned
>
>
> Edward B. Foley
> Director, Election Law @ Moritz
> Chief Justice Thomas J. Moyer Professor for the Administration of Justice
> and the Rule of Law
>
> The Ohio State University Moritz College of Law
> (614) 292-4288; foley.33 at osu.edu
> Website: www.electionlaw.osu.edu
>
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