Hartman, third female MP wins seat in Ubenide by-election
The by-election of the Constituency of Ubenide resulted in the
election of Gabrissa Hartman to fill the vacant fourth seat of
Ubenide making her the third female to successfully be elected into
the Nauru Parliament.
Polling opened at 9am on 19 January and closed at 6pm, after which
ballot boxes were then transported to parliament chambers under
police escort to be counted.
The by-election counting process follows a different system to the
general election by which the preferential counting system is
used.
Following the counting of first preference votes, there was no
absolute majority therefore prompting a second count of the ballot
papers. This continues to a count of the third, fourth and fifth
preference votes until a majority was reached, at each stage
eliminating the candidate with the least number of allocated
votes.
No candidate having received an absolute majority of first,
second, third, and fourth preference votes a twelfth count was made
of the ballot papers and as a result, the number of first, second,
third, fourth or fifth preference votes allocated to each of the
remaining two candidates were as follows:
Mr Wawani Dowiyogo, 696
Mrs Gabrissa Hartman, 817
Having received an absolute majority of votes cast Ms. Hartman was
declared elected by Electoral Commissioner Joseph Cain around 2am
this morning (20 January 2017).
Thirteen candidates contested the Ubenide by-election, among them
were four new candidates and two women.
The total number of votes cast was 1550 with 37 informal votes,
leaving 1513 as the number of valid votes to determine the result
of the by-election.
The by-election was called following the passing away of the late
Hon. Valdon Dowiyogo who served as minister for health, fisheries,
transport, port and sports in the cabinet of President Baron
Waqa.