A lone candidate Samten Lepcha, 35, has been nominated from Samtse gewog to contest the National Council (NC) election slated for April 20.

Samten Lepcha is a businessman based in Samtse.

Two gewog zomdus were held at different places to nominate the gewog’s candidate because of the relatively large size of the gewogs.

At the March 4 zomdu, Samten Lepcha received 209 yes votes against 63 no votes. He received 164 yes of the total 190 votes cast at the Bukay ORC (Outreach Clinic) yesterday.

Of the total votes from the two zomdus, he received 373 yes and 89 no votes.

Electoral officer of Samtse, Tshering Phuntsho, said that the people’s participation was encouraging. “The voter turnout is good,” he said.

The voting at the zomdu closed at 3pm yesterday.

The result for the gewog centre zomdu was also announced at the ORC. Most voters at the ORC had gathered early to cast their votes.

The last voter at the centre yesterday, Hari Ghallay, 56, said he was happy with the performance of the dzongkhag’s NC members.

When asked about his expectations from new members, the farmer from Malbasay village said, “We need better facilities like water taps.” He said the drinking water schemes were built in 2005.

“So far our NC members have done well. Now, we would like to see new members do even better in terms of facilitating development and policy changes,” he said.

Another voter said that he took voting as a responsibility although there was only one candidate.

The gewog zomdu in Samtse, which started on February 28, will end today with the nomination meeting at the Phuntshopelri gewog centre and Samtse Throm.

MB Subba | Samtse