The Election Commission (EC) has claimed to have lived up to its commitment to complete the counting of votes under the first-past-the-post (FPTP) category within four days after counting begins.

The counting of votes of the elections to the House of Representatives (HoR) and Provincial Assemblies had almost concluded by 7.30pm on Monday, the EC announcing the HoR results of 156 constituencies out of 165. It also declared results of 312 PA seats out of 330 by that time.

The vote counting had begun on December 7 in all districts where elections were held in first phase and on December 8 in the districts that went to the polls on December 7.

“We had the target of completing the vote count under the FPTP category by Monday and we have largely completed the job,” said Navaraj Dhakal, spokesperson for the EC. The EC had come under fire for taking more than two weeks to announce results of the local level elections which were held over three phases in May, June and September.

Ahead of the December 7 elections, the EC had announced that it would complete the vote count of elections under the FPTP category within four days and eight days in the case of elections under the PR category.

Dhakal attributed the quick announcement of results to the efficient management of the counting process by the EC and its staffers, and a “commendable political culture” exhibited by the political parties.

The counting of votes in Syangja began only on Sunday midnight after being suspended for a prolonged period.  The counting was suspended after the left alliance demanded a re-voting at five polling centres in constituency 2, accusing the Nepali Congress of capturing the polling booths at Sekham, Malyangkot and Darsingh.

According to Dhakal, the EC had suggested the chief election officers and election officers to form teams of enumerators based on the number of votes cast in particular constituency. “We had suggested them in writing about the number of teams they should form to complete the counting in 1-5 days,” he said. Such a suggestion was based on assumption that a team would count 3,000 FPTP ballots or 1,500 PR ballots in a day.