Wrote: Festim Rizanaj
Serbian language media outlet Alo.rs has published an article titled “Albanian theft of Serbian votes: CIK in Pristina does not include election results even after 10 days” (“Albanian theft of Serbian votes: CEC in Pristina does not include election results even after 10 days”), which alleges that the Central Election Commission in Pristina intentionally delayed the counting and publication of election results.
According to the article's title, even after ten days of holding the elections, the process has not yet been completed, raising allegations of attempts to steal the votes of Serbs in Kosovo.
After fact-checking conducted by hibrid.info, it was confirmed that the Serbian media outlet does not provide facts regarding the claim of vote theft by Serbian political entities, while the CEC has justified the delay in counting the votes and has ensured that the integrity of the vote has not been compromised.
Serbian media claims and CEC problems
The Serbian media outlet claims in the headline that the CEC in Pristina has intentionally delayed the announcement of the election results, accusing Albanians of stealing Serb votes, but without providing any facts to support this claim.
On a night when attention was focused on the Central Election Commission of Kosovo, the institution's online platform went offline for hours, causing confusion among the public awaiting the publication of the results of the February 9 parliamentary elections, even though CEC officials assured that the manual data collection would not have an impact on the outcome (here). However, there were occasional interruptions in the following days.
The CEC has justified the delay in counting the votes by emphasizing that the new counting process, determined by the new Law on Elections, is complex and is being implemented for the first time by this institution. (here)
The CEC dismissed these suspicions in a response on Wednesday, saying that “the integrity of the vote is not compromised and despite the delays caused by problems with the electronic platform, the final results will be accurate and based on the will of citizens expressed through their votes.” (here)
Despite the problems encountered by the CEC in counting the votes, it has been ensured that the citizen's vote and his will will be preserved, denying the claims of the Serbian media about vote theft.
Analyze:
The Serbian media outlet claims that the CEC in Pristina has intentionally delayed the announcement of the election results, accusing Albanians of stealing Serb votes, but without providing any facts to support this claim.
The CEC justified the delay in counting the votes by emphasizing that the new counting process is complex and that the integrity of the vote is not compromised.
Based on its work methodology, hibrid.info considers this claim to be "misinformation".
Reasoning:
"Disinformation" is defined as information content that contains a "mix" of inaccurate sources or even half-truthful attributes, and that is created and/or distributed with the deliberate intention of causing harm. The motive behind the producers/distributors of disinformation content lies in achieving a political, financial, psychological or social goal.