Pro Switzerland: Control mechanisms for signatures work
Published: Tuesday, Sep 3rd 2024, 17:20
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The day after suspected fraud in the collection of signatures for popular initiatives came to light, those mentioned in the media reports defended themselves. They had not worked with the company mentioned in the reports.
Pro Switzerland - the movement behind the neutrality initiative - condemns "scaremongering" in a press release. The initiative was successful with 129,806 valid signatures, according to the press release issued on Tuesday. Only 1.6 percent were invalid. This shows that the control mechanisms are working.
In its press release, Pro Switzerland called the "concern activism and scaremongering of some politicians" demanding that votes be stopped immediately ridiculous. Popular initiatives must be implemented in line with the will of the people.
According to the reports on suspected forgeries, the SVP initiative "No 10 million Switzerland!" is also allegedly affected by suspected fraud. SVP parliamentary group leader Thomas Aeschi denied this statement to Keystone-SDA: "The SVP Switzerland and the SVP Canton Zurich as the responsible parties did not mandate the Incop mentioned in the report, he emphasized.
Aeschi himself is responsible for the SVP's border protection initiative launched at the end of May and says he has repeatedly received and rejected offers from organizations to collect signatures. "Certain companies, all from western Switzerland, were very persistent and wanted to collect signatures for us for money," he says.
©Keystone/SDA
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