Apparently the process was recently digitalised.
When people arrived at the page to endorse a candidate, many of them likely skipped past the initial wall of text and some of them clicked the big “Log in” button, filled out a form, and were — unbeknownst to them — added to the list of candidates.
In the comments section of various news articles, people wondered, ‘What’s wrong with these people? Can’t they read? Will they even be able to vote?’
Reminds me of the time residents of Hawaii were notified of an inbound ballistic missile and advised to take shelter via an emergency push alert.
It turned out that it was just a system test and the operator had hit the wrong button (twice).
Good UX design is so important but often the first thing a company will sacrifice when under cost pressures. That’s if they care about it to begin with.