Jaime Bestard, president of the Superior Court of Electoral Justice (TSJE), gave a press conference where he stated that they had 22,000 voting machines. And that only 8,500 that were stored in the hall that caught fire were affected. Due to this situation they will ask for the splitting of the elections. That is, hold the party elections of the ANR on one Sunday and the next the presidential elections.
“The fire spread so quickly because the devices are made of flammable plastic, which created an emergency situation. The new building had nothing to do with the incident, ”he commented.
While there is a possibility that some of the 8,500 machines are still running, this has yet to be confirmed. According to the same firefighters, the fires affected a large number of machines.
He also stated that he believes it unlikely that the ballots will be used again for the next election. Regarding the official Aníbal Ortiz, who was able to remain inside the burned premises, he did not want to venture to give any hypotheses. He is coordinator of the Department of Concepción. Bestard stated that the priority is to recover it alive. At the end of this edition there were still no news.
The head of the TSJE stated that they have requested the intervention of the Prosecutor’s Office to clarify this case. Prosecutors have already had access to the closed circuit footage.
Bestard stressed that in principle this does not alter the electoral calendar since he considers that the split is reasonable. “The schedule essentially remains the same. In the market there are no more machines than these, they are manufactured exclusively for elections”, he commented.
Finally, he said that it is very premature to talk about the reasons for the fire, so he did not want to talk about conjectures. The fire was brought under control around 4:30 p.m. Thursday.
