Election Commissioner admonishes leaking

[Legislators’ Lounge] October 13

In a rebuke of candidates’ behaviour, the Election Commissioner, Mr. Belschaft, issued a series of statements denouncing the recent leaks of sensitive information.

‘I am not happy with the release of semi-classified/confidential material from a Cabinet controlled channel as part of an election campaign.’

Mr. Belschaft issued an informal notice to the candidate for Prime Minister, Mr. Islands of Unity, for his potentially illegal behaviour. The Election Commissioner referred back to his writ of election, which stated that the Commission would refer any legal transgressions conducted during the election to the appropriate authorities.

Mr. Islands of Unity has been named in a High Court case by the candidate for Minister of Military Affairs and current Chair of the Assembly, Mr. Roavin, for the crime of espionage. Mr. Roavin alleges Mr. Islands of Unity of having distributed confidential information contained within a Discord channel maintained by the Cabinet. Mr. Islands of Unity denies this allegation. Mr. Roavin also named himself as a person of interest in the case, due to his posting of a Cabinet transcript in his campaign thread. A High Court ruling to determine whether the case is justiciable is expected soon.

When asked by Mr. Roavin why he was not also being issued an informal notice for the same alleged crime, the Election Commissioner cited his secondary role in the affairs as the reason. ‘Well, based upon my understanding of what has occurred you didn’t so much release material from a confidential area as make publicly known that such a release had occured.’

The Election Commissioner previously objected to concerns over Mr. Islands of Unity use of direct-messaging campaigning.

‘As EC I’m not very happy with the attacks on Islands over his use of DM’s to campaign/target potential voters. It is entirely legal, and used to be incredibly common in TSP. I think most of our elections in the 2013-15 period saw extensive private campaigning by most candidates.’

‘The suggestion that he is doing something improper or illegal is completely false.’