[lac-discuss-en] The Election of LACRALO Chair at Mexico City

[Carlton Samuels]

Dear Colleagues:
I trust that by now you would have had an opportunity to review the
contested proceedings at the GA and adduced the facts from the evidence.

For those of you who have listened to the tape, two (2) things should be
abundantly clear 1) That there was a vote cast by Devnet  2) That the vote
was cast in favour of Andres Piazza. The official count records and reflects
the intent of the voter. And it should now be past dispute that Sergio
Salinas Porto was incorrectly declared Chair of LACRALO immediately after
the vote.

By your votes and as evidenced by the official count, Andres Piazza was duly
elected Chair of LACRALO.  I apologize unreservedly to both Sergio and
Andres for the error in reporting and the emotional trauma it might have
caused.

All this aside, the rhetoric of a few members continue to make claims that
are unsupportable by the facts and and does violence to reason.  In his
specific case, Sergio Salinas claims an office which, by your votes, is
illegitimate. Interestingly, we have seen claims of violations of human
rights, presumably Sergio's since these orators conveniently forget the
inalienable rights of Devnet. Threats are made to invite external
intervention by several regional agencies.  Not only is this baseless but
may be interpreted as a cynical attempt to do a rerun of Bush vs. Gore 2004.

The LACRALO rules prefer decision by consensus over voting. But once a vote
is called, the procedure is balanced so that no one member may capture or
determine the outcome of an election.

All legitimate LACRALO members may stand for an election and Sergio
exercised that right without secondary qualification.

All LACRALO members in good standing are entitled to vote for the person of
their choice and that has occured.

All LACRALO members are entitled to see the vote they cast reflected in the
results.  DevNet, in common  with Internauta Brazil, Internauta Argentina,
ACUI or, for that matter, Ageia Densi, cannot be estranged from this right.

In the end, there are no guaranteed winners, regardless of how personally
deserving or desirous that member may see himself or herself. Consequently,
the member does the work of a demagogue to continue to invoke democratic
rules and in the next breath, dismiss the plural vote of the LACRALO General
Assembly.

I wish to assure Staff that despite some crass claims of conspiracy, the
overwhelming majority of LACRALO members recognize a simple error when it is
made and dismiss all such charges as ludicrous, if not offensive.

As the presiding officer at the GA elections, I take personal responsibility
for communicatiing the error.  So far as I am concerned, the communication
is corrected and the substantive results for the election of Chair, LACRALO
is communicated.

Kind regards,
Carlton Samuels