SOVEREIGN FOUNDATION
ELECTION OBSERVATION MISSION ON BEHALF OF THE
EUROPEAN FOUNDATION FOR FREEDOM
PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS
BULGARIA
6TH AND 13TH OF NOVEMBER 2016
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SUMMARY
LIST OF THE ABBREVIATIONS…………………………………………p.3
INTRODUCTION.…………………………………………………………...p.4
I. BACKGROUND………………………………………….………………..p.4
Part 1 “The Presidential institution in Bulgaria”…………………………....p.4
Part 2 “Legal basis”…………………………………………………………...p.8
Part 3 “Electoral system”……………………………………………………..p.8
Part 4 “Eligibility”…………………………………………………………….p.9
Part 5 “Right to vote”…………………………………………………………p.9
Part 6 “Election administration”……………………………………………..p.11
Part 7 “Registration procedure”……………………………………………...p.13
Part 8 “Electoral observation”…………………………………………….….p.16
Part 9 “Electoral campaign”………………………………………………….p.17
Part 10 “Ballots and voting”………………………………………………….p.19
II. CONDUCT OF THE 2016 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS…………..p.21
Part 1 “Preliminary matters”…………………………………………………p.21
Part 2 “The candidates”………………………………………………………p.21
Part 3 “Electoral campaign”………………………………………………….p.28
Part 4 “Election Day”…………………………………………………………p.28
Part 5 “Counting of the votes and determining the results”………………...p.28
III. EVALUATION OF THE ELECTIONS………………………………..p.29
Part 1 “Electoral legislation”…………………………………………………p.29
Part 2 “Freeness of the elections”…………………………………………….p.29
Part 3 “Fairness of the elections”…………………………………………….p.29
Part 4 “Conclusions”………………………………………………………….p.30
IV. POLITICAL EVALUATION……………………………………………p.30
V. DE LEGE FERENDA RECOMMENDATIONS………………………...p.31
Part 1 “Constitutional recommendations”……………………………………p.31
Part 2 “Recommendations regarding the Electoral Code”…………………..p.33
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LIST OF THE ABBREVIATIONS USED IN THE REPORT
ABR – “Alternative for Bulgarian Renaissance” political party
BBB – “Bulgarian Business Block” political party
BNTV – Bulgarian National Television
BSP – “Bulgarian Socialist Party”
BwC – “Bulgaria without Censorship” political party/coalition
CEC – Central Electoral Committee
CEDB – “Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria” political party
CPC – Competition Protection Commission
IC – Initiative Committee
IMRO – “Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization” political party
MEP – Member of European Parliament
MP – Member of Parliament
MRD – Ministry of Regional Development
MRF – “Movement for Rights and Freedoms” political party
NAO – National Audit Office
NFSB – “National Front for Salvation of Bulgaria” political party
NGO – Non-Government Organization
PSEC – Polling Station Electoral Committee
REC – Regional Electoral Committee
SAC – Supreme Administrative Court
UK – United Kingdom
UP – “United Patriots” coalition
USA – United States of America
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INTRODUCTION
The aim of the present report is:
1) to give general information on how the President and the Vice President of the Republic
are elected in Bulgaria and what are their powers and functions;
2) to make analysis of the way the Presidential Elections held on 6th and 13th of November
2016 were conducted and of the elections’ accordance with the Venice Commission Code of
Good Practices in Electoral Matters (hereinafter – “The Venice Commission Code”);
3) to give evaluation for the elections in two dimensions: whether the elections were free and
whether the elections were fair;
4) to make political analysis of the results;
5) to make recommendations de lege ferenda.
I.
BACKGROUND
Part 1
The presidential institution in Bulgaria
The President is the Head-of-State and embodies the unity of the Bulgarian nation. The
presidential institution is provided for in Chapter 4 of the Constitution – right after the
Chapter about the National Assembly. Thus the Constitution follows the basic principle that
Bulgaria is a Parliamentary Republic (placing the Parliament before the President in the
constitutional order of the State).
The Constitution envisages that the President is elected directly by the people under free and
universal suffrage. The term of office is set at 5 years. A limitation exists that no one could be
elected as President more than twice. However the exact wording of the constitutional text
(“Art.95, par.1 The President and the Vice President could be reelected at the same position
only once.”) leaves room for debate if a person that has served two terms and then skipped
one or more terms could be elected again. Presidential elections have to take place between 3
and 2 months before the expiration of the mandate of the incumbent President, thus there’s a
guarantee that no vacancy should occur at the presidential seat.
The Constitution also provides for a Vice President, making Bulgaria the only Republic in EU
to have such an institution. The Vice President is elected on the same ballot together with the
President and under the same conditions. The Vice President assists the President in the
discharge of the latter’s functions. Hereinafter in this report, when there are specific
provisions about the Vice President, those will be explicitly mentioned. When there’s no
mention it could be considered that the provisions for the President also apply to the Vice
President.
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The position of President is incompatible with any other state function. The President shall
not engage in any public and private economic activity and could not participate in the
management of political parties. However the President could be a member of a political party
as long as he/she does not hold a position in the respective party’s organs. The Constitutional
Court also has upheld that the President is a political figure and thus has the right of political
belonging and of political views.
Presidential powers
The Constitution does not place the President in any of the 3 branches of Government. In that
respect the Bulgarian Basic Law differs from other Constitutions, wherein the presidential
institution is officially part of the executive. In the legal theory the presidential institution in
Bulgaria is described as a fourth – “mediation” or “balancing” branch. Generally the President
discharges his/hers functions under the principle of “bound competence”. In most of the cases
the President could not act on his/her own, but has to receive a proposal, usually from the
Council of Ministers.
Article 98 of the Constitution contains a non-exclusive list of the presidential powers. The
President: 1) fixes the dates of the Parliamentary and the Local elections and of the nationwide referendums; 2) addresses the People and the National Assembly; 3) signs international
treaties when the law provides that his/hers signature is required; 4) promulgates the Acts of
the Parliament into law; 5) affirms the boundaries of the administrative units, to which the
country is divided; 6) appoints and dismisses the ambassadors and other high-ranking
diplomats and receives the credentials and the letters of recall of the foreign diplomatic
representatives; 7) appoints and dismisses state officials in those cases prescribed by the law;
8) bestows state decorations and medals; 9) gives and reinstates Bulgarian citizenship,
releases citizens of their Bulgarian citizenship and revokes the citizenship; 10) gives asylum;
11) dispenses pardon; 12) remits uncollectable state dues; 13) names the landmarks with
national importance and the inhabited places; 14) informs the National Assembly on the
general matters under his/hers competences. Many other Articles of the Constitution grant
additional powers to the President. They will be described in short in the following
paragraphs.
The President oversees the procedure under which the Government is formed. In the latter
procedure the President consults the parliamentary groups and then gives a mandate to a
candidate for Prime Minister nominated by the largest parliamentary group. The candidate has
to return to the President a proposal for structure of the Council of Ministers and a list with
the names of the Minsters. If the first candidate fails to do so, the President shall give the
mandate to a candidate nominated by the second largest parliamentary group. If the second
candidate also fails to propose a Cabinet, the President gives the mandate to a third
parliamentary group on his/hers choosing. In an occasion of a third failure, the President is
obliged to dissolve the Parliament, to appoint care-take Cabinet and to call early elections.
The President however cannot dissolve Parliament in the last 3 months of his/hers term of
office. In the latter case the President only appoints a care-take Cabinet. When a candidate for
a Prime Minister succeeds to propose structure and Ministers, the President refers the
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proposal to the National Assembly asking the latter to elect the Cabinet. It’s worth noting that
the President does not appoint the Government and, once a Government is elected, the
President does not have any powers or functions when changes occur in the Cabinet.
Therefore the President is decisively distanced away from the executive branch.
The President is the commander-in-chief of the armed forces. As such the President appoints
and dismisses the High Command of the armed forces and promotes the officers to the
different Supreme ranks (“General” ranks for the Land Forces and the Air Force and
“Admiral” ranks for the Navy). The President does so on a proposal by the Government. The
President presides over the sessions of the Consultative Council on National Security. The
President declares full or partial mobilization. Finally the President could declare state of war,
martial law or state of emergency when the Parliament is not in session. In the latter cases the
Parliament shall be convened as soon as possible to uphold or to repeal the actions of the
President.
The President has the right to veto an Act of the Parliament by sending the Act back to the
Parliament for reconsideration. The Parliament can overcome the veto by a qualified majority
of more than half of all MPs. Then the President is obliged to promulgate the Act into law.
Other powers of the President worth noticing are: convenes the inaugural session of the newly
elected Parliament; has the right to consult the Constitutional Court; appoints and dismisses
the Presidents of the Supreme Administrative Court and the Supreme Court of Cassation and
the Prosecutor General – on proposal by the High Judicial Council; appoints 1/3 of the
Justices in the Constitutional Court; can propose a bill to amend the Constitution and can
propose the convocation of a Grand National Assembly (both subject to approval by the
Parliament).
Many other powers are granted to the President via Acts of the Parliament. Those are usually
related or similar to the Constitutional powers of the President, e.g. under the provisions of
the Electoral Code the President sets the date of the European elections.
In conclusion – it’s obvious that in the Bulgarian system of government the President has
many powers. In that regard the Bulgarian presidential institution goes well beyond the usual
ceremonial function of the presidential office characteristic for the parliamentary republics.
Powers of the Vice President
Article 104 of the Constitution stipulates that the President can delegate to the Vice President
the execution of the presidential powers in regard of the lesser administrative appointments,
the citizenship matters, the asylum matters and the presidential pardon (Art.98, points 7, 9, 10
and 11 of the Constitution). It is considered that the powers that could be delegated by the
President to the Vice President are exclusively listed in the Constitution and the President
could not delegate any other of his/hers many powers (including those created by an Act of
the Parliament) to the Vice President.
Acts of the President
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The President exercises his/hers powers by issuing decrees. Most of the decrees need a
counter-signature by a Minister to have legal force. This is another interesting constitutional
provision relating to the exclusion of the President from the executive. The decrees that are
excluded form counter-signature are those, with which the President: appoints a care-take
Cabinet; gives the mandate for the formation of Government; dissolves the Parliament;
imposes veto on an Act of the Parliament; adopts the regulatory and operational framework of
the Presidential Office; sets the dates of elections and referendums; promulgates the Acts of
the Parliament. In those matters the presidential discretion is absolute and protected against
interference from the executive.
The presidential decrees could be challenged in front of the Constitutional Court for their
conformity with the Constitution.
Presidential immunity, impeachment and removal from office
The President has an almost absolute immunity over his/hers actions done in official capacity.
The President is only liable for high treason and for breach of the Constitution. The liability
takes form of an impeachment procedure. The Parliament can impeach the President on
charges brought forward by at least 1/4 of the MPs and the decision is passed with the votes
of more than 2/3 of the MPs. The constitutional wording “more than two thirds” is
interesting, as usually the qualified majority requires the attainment of the fraction and not
more than that fraction. If the Parliament impeaches the President, the charges are sent to the
Constitutional Court, to which the final decision to remove the President from office belongs.
Furthermore the President, while in office, virtually cannot be persecuted for any crime, even
when it’s perpetrated while the President was acting not in his/hers official capacity. The
charges could be brought against the President only after his/hers mandate expires or the
President is removed from office.
Early termination of the mandate, vacancies and line of succession
The mandate of the President is terminated early when: the President resigns; the President is
permanently incapacitated to discharge his/hers duties due to a severe illness (the permanent
incapacitation is subject of determination by the Constitutional Court); the Constitutional
Court upholds the impeachment charges, which leads to removal from office; the President
dies. The same applies to the Vice President. If the President’s mandate is terminated early,
the Vice President shall fill the vacancy until the end of the term.
Early termination of the Vice President’s mandate leaves the vice-presidential office vacant
for the remainder of the term and the Constitution does not provide a procedure to fill-in the
vacancy. The latter happened once since the adoption of the Constitution in 1991 – on 6th of
June 1993 Vice President Blaga Dimitrova resigned and the office was vacant until 22nd of
January 1997.
If both the offices of the President and the Vice President fall vacant, the Chairperson of the
National Assembly becomes President Pro Tempore. In such occasion fresh Presidential
elections shall take place within two months.
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Part 2
Legal basis
The elections in Bulgaria are organized under the provisions of the Electoral Code. As in
Bulgaria all laws have the same legal power (there is no separation between “ordinary law”
and “law of a higher statute”, except the acts to amend the Constitution), the Electoral Code
follow the rules for adoption and amendment of all other laws, issued by an act of the
Parliament.
The first Electoral Code was adopted in 2011. Before that the rules for every type of election
(presidential, parliamentarian, local and European) were written in separate laws. In 2014 a
new Electoral Code was adopted, repealing the old one. (NB! Hereinafter “Electoral Code”
refers to the Electoral Code of 2014 if not specified otherwise!) Since its entry into force, on
5th of March 2014, the Electoral Code saw a total of 7 amendments in a span of about two and
a half years. The latest three amendments, that have an effect on the 2016 Presidential
elections, entered into force on 25th of May 2016 (less than 6 months before the election), on
22nd of July 2016 (less than 4 months before the election) and on 28th of October 2016 (just 9
days before the election!) respectively. Their aims and effects are described in detail below, as
well as their conformity with the Venice Commission Code.
Art. 93 of the Constitution is also a primary source of electoral legislation in regard to the
Presidential elections, as it sets the rules for the eligibility and the electoral system.
Part 3
Electoral system
The system envisaged by Art. 93, par. 3 and 4 of the Constitution is direct election by the
people with a possible run-off. A candidate is elected on the first round if: 1) he/she has
received more than a half of the valid votes cast; 2) the turn-out (both valid and invalid votes
cast, taken together) is more than a half of all the citizens with a right to vote. If neither one of
those two conditions is satisfied, a run-off shall take place within 7 days from the first round.
The run-off is contested between the two candidates that have attained the most votes on the
first round. The Electoral Code expands a little bit on that constitutional construction, in order
to accommodate some other possible scenarios, like when a candidate decides to withdraw or
dies between the two rounds. Those provisions of the Electoral Code have not been checked
by the Constitutional Court for their conformity with the Constitution. However unlikely the
additional scenarios in the Electoral Code are, it is our opinion that they pose a thread, if some
of them actually occur in the future, an election to be challenged as unconstitutional.
On the second round the winner is the candidate who receives more votes than his/hers
opponent. The turn-out requirement is lifted for the run-off.
Since the first Presidential elections in 1991 there never was a first-round winner. Only once,
in 2005 election, the incumbent President Georgi Parvanov, on his reelection bid, was able to
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carry more than half of the valid votes cast on the first round. The turn-out however was
42,51%, precipitating a run-off with the runner-up Volen Siderov. Parvanov easily won the
second round with a landslide, receiving more than 1 million votes more than his opponent.
Part 4
Eligibility
Art.93, par.2 of the Constitution stipulates that the President (respectively – the Vice
President) shall: 1) be a Bulgarian citizen by the virtue of birth (naturalized citizens are
therefore excluded); 2) not have any other citizenship; 3) have attained the age of 40 years; 4)
enjoy full political rights (is not under legal incapacitation and is not serving a term of
imprisonment); 5) have resided in Bulgaria for the last 5 years prior to the elections. In 2001
the Constitutional Court provided an interpretation of the Constitution in regard of the 5years-residence requirement. The Court ruled that, in order the requirement to be satisfied, the
candidate has to have physically resided within the borders of the country more than a half of
the span of each of the 5 astronomical years prior to the Election Day. The candidate is
considered to have resided in Bulgaria if he/she was abroad on official state business (e.g. as
ambassador).
Part 5
Right to vote
All Bulgarian citizens that have attained the age 18 have the right to vote on the Presidential
elections. The citizens that are put (via a court decision) under legal incapacitation, or are
serving effectively a prison sentence, are considered deprived of political rights and are
disenfranchised.
The obligatory vote issue
With the 25th of May 2016 amendment of the Electoral Code, for the first time after the fall of
the Communist regime, obligatory voting was introduced. However the reform sparkled a
heated debate in Parliament. The main topic of that debate was what would be the sanction for
those voters that neglect their voting obligations. It was also brought forward (as it’s dully
noted in the Venice Commission Code) that the abstention could be powerful political
statement, so if the citizens are obliged to vote, then they should be given the possibility of
active abstention.
On the topic of sanctions, the final solution was those citizens that do not take part in the
election to be removed from the electoral registers, but only after any voter did not vote on
two consecutive elections of the same kind and only from the register for that kind of election.
In practice that is – a voter that do not vote on 2016 Presidential election and on the next
Presidential elections (most probably in 2021) will be removed from the Presidential elections
register for the 2026 elections. To avoid a contradiction with art.42 of the Constitution, which
grants a voting right to all citizens, a voter that has been removed from the register could
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apply to be reintroduced in it. So at the end the sanction for not voting was delayed – to
probably take effect in the future and can be easily overcome.
NB! Before this report was finished the Constitutional Court repealed the sanctions for
non-voting by deeming them unconstitutional. The Court was consulted by the Ombudsman
and only about the conformity of the sanctions for non-voting with the Constitution. As the
Court could not go beyond the scope of the issues it is consulted with, it did not ruled on the
constitutionality of the obligatory vote itself. Thus the obligatory voting remains, however
the failure to preform that obligation is now virtually without any consequence.
The abstention vote issue
On the abstention issue, the Parliament decided that an option “I do not support any of the
candidates” to be added in the ballot. However an addition was also made in the Methodic for
determining the election’s result, envisaging that although abstention votes shall be counted as
valid votes, they will not be taken into account when determining if a candidate has won more
than half of the vote to become a first-round winner. At the time of its adoption the latter
change went absolutely unnoticed by the public. With the Election Day approaching however
the new Methodic got noticed and brought up a wide public disgruntle. The first argument
against it was that it is directly unconstitutional, as art.93, par.3 of the Constitution requires
that in order to be a first-round winner, a candidate should have received “more than a half of
the valid votes cast”. And since the abstention votes are deemed valid, they should not be
excluded in the determination of the result. More practical concern of the society was that in
such a way the main governing party “Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria”
(CEDB) was trying to secure a loophole so its candidate, while failing to carry more than half
of the valid vote, could still become a first-round winner. As the issue grew and caused more
and more public resentment, CEDB was forced to table and pass through the Parliament an
amendment to the Electoral Code, which entered into force a mere 9 days before the Election
Day. However the created impression of foul play by CEDB did not go away and
possibly precipitated the final defeat of CEDB’s candidate.
The polling stations abroad issue
The Bulgarian democratic electoral legislation always allowed for polling stations in foreign
countries to be formed, so Bulgarians living abroad could vote, provided that certain
conditions are met. The availability of polling stations abroad is in direct connection with the
right to vote as those stations provide the possibility for the citizens, living abroad to exercise
their right. The condition for a polling station to be opened in a foreign country is a certain
number of citizens (that number varied through time; however it was never greater than 100)
to apply in advance in front of the respective Bulgarian diplomatic mission. For every
500/1.000 (that number also varied in the past) applications, a new polling station is required
to be formed. Once a polling station is formed, any citizen could vote in it without prior
notification. Those citizens are required to sign a written affidavit that they will not vote
anywhere else and that they are aware that voting more than once constitutes a criminal
offence.
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The polling stations in Turkey are a standing issue in the past 15 years or so. The latter always
see an enormous turn out and the vote is always overwhelmingly in favor of the Movement
for Rights and Freedoms – a party that draws its membership and support mostly from the
Bulgarian Turks. In the southern regions of Bulgaria a high amount of migration from Turkey
is observed in election days, leading to suspicions of double voting. The latter is – those
citizens that live in Turkey vote once there and then come to Bulgaria, where they vote again.
Suspicions (supported by eye-witness accounts and some journalistic investigations) that the
citizens in Turkey vote under the orders (controlled voting) of the local community leaders
also persist. In addition, as most parties could not supply the PSECs abroad with their own
representatives those PSECs are filled in by staff members from the Foreign Ministry, and
particularly in Turkey – overwhelmingly by representatives of the Movement from Rights and
Freedoms as the latter do not seem to have any problem to supply such representatives.
With an unprecedented decision, in 2010 the Constitutional Court proclaimed the vote in 23
polling section in Turkey for the 2009 Parliamentary elections to be unlawful, invalidating
18.140 votes for the Movement for Rights and Freedoms and 218 votes for all the other
parties and coalitions in the elections combined. Although the Court found irregularities in
virtually all polling stations in Turkey (e.g. unlawfully formed polling stations, polling
stations, in which more people voted than physically possible, etc.), it decided to invalidate
the vote only in those, where all the votes can actually be linked to their respective electoral
subjects without a violation of the secrecy of the vote.
To address the above-described issues, an amendment to the Electoral Code (in force form
25th of May 2016) provided that no more than 35 polling stations could be formed in any
foreign country. That outraged the large Bulgarian communities, mainly in UK, in USA and
in Germany and they started to protest. So a new amendment (in force from 22nd of July 2016)
limited the restriction only to the foreign countries outside EU. That approach however was
no fix at all as: it does not solve the problem with the community in USA; as it was adopted
after the BrExit referendum, the community in UK will also be put under the restriction as
soon as Brittan leaves the EU and most importantly – the question, is it at all constitutional as
it treats the citizens residing in and out of EU differently.
Part 6
Election administration
Electoral committees
The elections are administered mainly by the electoral committees. There are three tiers of
committees:
1) The Central Electoral Committee (CEC) – it organizes the electoral process in general and
oversees the activities of the lower-tier committees.
2) Regional electoral committees (REC) – on local level the elections are administered by
REC. The constituencies from the latest parliamentary elections, held prior to the Presidential
elections, are used. In general each one of Bulgaria’s 27 administrative regions (oblasti) forms
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one constituency, with two exceptions for the two largest cities – there are 3 constituencies
formed within the Capital Municipality of Sofia, and 2 constituencies in Polvdiv Oblast – one
for the Plovdiv City Municipality and one for the rest of the Oblast. The latter five bring the
total number of RECs to 31.
3) Polling station electoral committees (PSEC) – one for each polling station. PSECs prepare
the polling stations for the vote; they mange the actual voting process on election day; after
the voting is over they count the votes, fill protocols with the results from the polling stations
and hand over all the electoral documents to their respective RECs.
The electoral committees are collective organs and exercise their powers by adopting
resolutions. A qualified majority of 2/3 of the members present is required for a resolution to
be passed.
The central government has an auxiliary role in the organization of the elections. Support is
provided mostly by the Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of Regional Development
(MRD) through their concerned agencies. One example is the Civil Registration and
Administrative Services Agency of the MRD that provide information for the preparation of
the electoral registers.
Central Electoral Committee
It is a permanent authority. Its President, Vice Presidents and Secretary (Bureau Members) are
elected by the National Assembly and the remaining ordinary Members are appointed by the
President of the Republic. All Members serve for 5 years term. They are representatives
proposed by the parties that have Groups in Parliament or have MEPs. All Members
(including the Bureau) have to have a higher education with a Master degree and at least 7
years of professional experience.
With the Electoral Code of 2014 the judicial review over CEC was extended to include all its
acts. The resolutions of CEC can be challenged in front of the Supreme Administrative Court
(SAC). The legal proceeding is fast and streamlined with SAC usually delivering final
decision within 3 to 5 days form the tabling of the challenge.
Regional Electoral Committees
RECs are appointed by the CEC 50 days before the Presidential elections and serve until a
fortnight after the Election Day. As CEC, RECs also are formed by representatives of the
Parliamentary parties and those parties represented in the European Parliament. A higher
education without prejudice towards the degree is a prerequisite. As of 25th of May 2016 a
new requirement for clear criminal record (only for intentional crimes committed; crimes due
to negligence are excluded) was added in the Electoral Code in respect to the members of
RECs, thus equalizing the RECs with the CEC in that regard.
During Presidential elections the RECs have only minor role. The only really important
function they have is to monitor if the rules about the electoral campaign are observed in the
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respective territory each REC is functioning. RECs’ resolutions could be appealed in front of
CEC. The CEC decision on the appeal then could be brought in front of SAC.
Polling station electoral committees
PSEC’s are appointed by the RECs. It’s PSEC’s responsibility to receive the ballots, the
registers and the other materials, required for the conduct of the vote and to prepare the
polling station itself. That usually happens the day before the Election Day. On the Election
Day PSECs manage the actual process of the voting and after the end of the Election Day
PSECs count the votes and then they transmit the electoral documents to the RECs.
Although PSECs also adopt resolutions, as this usually happens on Election Day and under
some organizational pressure, the decisions are practically informal. Yet the respective REC,
and sometimes even CEC, intervene to correct transgressions committed by a certain PSEC.
As PSECs have to do all their very important and sometimes quite eventful work in the span
of a single day, a high competence of their Members is a basic prerequisite for a lawful and
fair electoral process.
Part 7
Registration procedure
Three types of electoral subjects could register for the Presidential elections: 1) political
parties; 2) coalitions formed by political parties and 3) initiative committees (IC) of the
citizens. The requirements are almost uniform for all three types with some differences
towards the ICs described below.
Parties and coalitions
Parties have to table a request for registration to the CEC. To the request form the parties have
to attach: 1) a certificate from the National Audit Office (NAO) as proof that the party has
tabled in due time its yearly financial reports for the previous 3 years, as required by the
Political Parties Act; 2) a list of 2.500 signatories (citizens with voting rights) that support the
registration of the party; 3) a bank document, certifying that the party has paid a deposit of
2.500 levs (about EUR 1.278) to a special account, opened by CEC.
Two or more parties could form a coalition. Each party in the coalition has to present a
certificate that it has tabled in due time its financial reports with the NAO. However the
deposit and signatures requirements are the same no matter how many parties take part in the
coalition – they are still 2.500 signatures and 2.500 levs deposit for the entire coalition.
Both the parties running individually and the coalitions must table for registration at latest 35
days prior to the Election Day, providing all necessary documents with the registration form.
Initiative committees and Independent candidates
Besides the parties and the coalitions, candidatures could be put forward also by initiative
committees. An IC is created by not less than 21 citizens with voting rights that actually
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reside in the country. The foundation of an IC is informal; however every IC has to table a
request for registration to the CEC. As informal organizations, created only for the purpose to
register candidates for the upcoming election, the ICs are not required to provide a certificate
from the NAO. An IC has to table the registration form, signed by all of its members, 40 days
prior to the Election Day, together with a document that the monetary deposit is dully paid.
The deposit for ICs is set at a significantly lower level – at 100 levs (about EUR 51). The ICs
also have 5 more days to table the list of signatories (the same as required for the parties and
the coalitions – 2.500 signatures).
The candidates that are put forward by ICs are labeled as “Independent”. The Electoral Code
stipulates that those state officials, who are proclaimed by the law as depoliticized (e.g.
judges, prosecutors, policemen, etc.) could run only as independents.
Lists of signatories – issues
The electoral subjects are obliged to collect the signatures necessary for the registration on a
special form, issued by the CEC. The form is issued by the CEC also electronically and each
electoral subject can download it from CEC’s official web-site and then just fill in its name
and print-out the copies it needs. During the term of the standing CEC the latter acted in good
faith, trying to release the form as early before the election as possible. However late
amendments of the Electoral Code forced CEC to reissue the forms. Although CEC did so in
good time, the occasion shows that the signatures requirement could be abused to block minor
parties from taking part in the election. Also one of the requisites is the form to contain the
actual date, on which the election will take place. The election date has to be determined (for
the Presidential elections – via a decision of the Parliament) not later than 60 days prior the
set Election Day. Thus there is, at most, a 25 days period in which the electoral subjects could
in practice collect signatures. In general the collection could begin earlier (as early as CEC
publishes the form) however the lack of clear rules on the validity of the form (e.g. could the
election date be written in the form by hand or has to be printed on it) prevents such efforts. It
is our opinion that the interval for collecting signatures is too short and thus it is
preventive towards the lesser electoral subjects (e.g. newly established parties, newly
formed coalitions and all the ICs in general) to take part in the elections.
Another severe controversy is the requirement set by the Electoral Code that one citizen could
sign in support of only one electoral subject. In the occasions when one citizen signed in
support of more than one subject, his/her signature is processed on “first come – first serve
basis”, which is – whichever is the subject that applied first for the registration, it has the
signature counted as valid, while all those electoral subject that follow, they get those
signatures invalidated. This creates an enormous uncertainty, especially for the smaller
subjects (the latter usually collect signatures up until the very last day, while the larger parties
and coalitions are usually ready to apply on the first day the registration is opened by CEC) on
how many signatures they have to collect. The smaller subjects do not have any means to
know if those voters, that are signing for them have not already signed for someone else. Thus
the minor subjects, in practice, have to collect at least twice the required number of signatures
just to be sure no repetitions will occur that might disqualify them. Meanwhile it is an easily
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observed attitude of the citizens to sign for more than one subject, because they fear that if
they sign only for one, this actually will wave the secrecy of their vote, or they refuse to sign
at all. We find that the requirement a signature to be proclaimed invalid, if the same
citizen already has signed for another subject, to be in direct breach of the Equal
Opportunity principle. It also goes against the Political Pluralism principle, as each
citizen may like to see more subjects (thus – more candidates) standing for election so
he/she could have more options to choose from (which is – greater Freedom to express
his/her wishes). As the collection of signatures takes place before the start of the
electoral campaign, it is plausible to consider that at that point any voter could have
several favorites but still has not decided whom to vote for.
CEC sends all the lists of signatories tabled by the electoral subjects to be checked for the
validity of the signatures to the Civil Registration and Administrative Services Agency. We
find the verification process to be utterly non-transparent! Although the verification
Agency issues a report on how many signatures are valid and how many are not (due to the
signatory lacking political rights, being a minor or being deceased; because the signatory has
already signed for another subject that applied for registration earlier; or because the signatory
could not be identified in the data base), the verification Agency does not provide information
why exactly it considers each concrete signature valid or invalid. This makes the
determination of the Agency on the validity of the signatory list impossible to be challenged
in front of a court. Furthermore the larger subjects usually collect and table much more than
the 2.500 signatures needed for registration (they do so mainly driven by PR purposes). The
rule, established by CEC, is that whenever 2.500 valid signatures are confirmed, the check
should stop, however it is not clear if the remaining signatures are not put in the data base, so
if there is a repetition in another subject’s list, the repeated signature then to be declared
invalid.
In general our conclusion is that the collection of signatures requirement creates more
problems than it solves. It remains highly controversial, prone to fraudulent behavior,
both by the electoral subject and by the administration and a liability to be used as a
political tool to block the path for opponents to register.
Monetary deposit refund
The required monetary deposit of 2.500 levs is refunded to the electoral subjects that has
received at least 1% of the valid votes cast. In 2011 the Parliament passed an amendment to
raise that threshold to 2%. That amendment however was challenged in front of the
Constitutional Court and the Court declared it unconstitutional. The Court reasoned that the
higher threshold is non-proportional and excessive.
The electoral subjects that fail to gain 1% of the vote or whose registrations are denied due to
failure to comply with some of the other registration requirements forfeit their deposits. The
forfeited sums are then automatically donated to the State Fund for Children with Special
Health Treatment Needs.
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Part 8
Electoral observation
Partisan observation
All parties, coalitions and ICs, registered for the election have the right to register
“intercessors”. The rights of the intercessors are the same as those of the non-partisan
observers.
Non-partisan observation – background
Internal official non-partisan observation was non-existent prior to the Electoral Code of 2014
(international observers were allowed ad hoc). The latter created a right for the “registered
Bulgarian non-government organizations” to register as observer-organizations and to
register observers. There’s no legal definition in the Bulgarian legislation what is a nongovernment organization, but it could be assumed (and generally – was assumed by the CEC)
that the registered non-profit legal entities fit the definition.
I order to be able to identify the one major issue with the non-partisan observation that
occurred for the 2016 Presidential elections, a short explanation on Bulgarian non-profits have
to be provided. The Non-profit Legal Persons Act sets the framework of the non-profits in
Bulgaria. There are two types of non-profits – associations and foundations. Both types could
determine their activity to be either in public interest or in private interest. Those non-profits,
operating in public interest are subject to additional requirements on their set-up, activities
and transparency. The major difference between the two types of non-profits is that the
associations are composed by members (natural persons or legal entities) while the
foundations do not have a membership compositions. The foundations have only organs, set
in their respective bylaw. While the articles of the Non-profit Legal Entities Act about
associations are quite extensive, the rules on foundations are very few, often referring quite
arbitrary to those about the associations.
Non-partisan observation – restriction issue
With the amendment of the Electoral Code of 25th of May 2016 a restriction was placed on
which non-government organizations (NGOs) could register as observers. The new rules
required the NGOs to be “only associations operating in public interest by their legal form
and having the protection of the political rights of the citizens among their aims”. That
particular amendment was proposed between first and second reading of the Act amending the
Electoral Code (which is – it was not part of the original bill). No written justification was
provided for this proposal and it was voted by the Parliament without any debate.
While we consider the reasons why an observer organization should operate in public interest
(excluding those operating in private interest) to be a self-evident one, it is our opinion that: 1)
for the sake of transparency any amendment of the electoral legislation has to be properly
justified, either in written, or verbally – by its proponents during the debate in the Parliament;
2) the requirement the observer organization to have the protection of the political rights of
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the citizens explicitly listed among its aims is non-proportional as the legality of an election is
a legitimate point of interest for any NGO that operates in public interest; 3) the full
exclusions of the foundations from gaining official observer status is an undemocratic
restriction on the right of the citizens’ organizations to play a controlling role over the
electoral process.
The above-described measure decimated the internal observation of the elections by the
Bulgarian civil society. A check in the public registers of CEC shows that the number of
the registered observer organizations dropped from 26 for the 2015 General Local
Elections to just 8 for the 2016 Presidential Elections – more than 4-fold decrease. It is
our opinion that the restriction is in direct contradiction to paragraph 87 of the
Explanatory Report of the Venice Commission Code, particularly to its in fine part,
stating “it is best to make the observation procedure as broad as possible”. We could not
conclude otherwise but that the restriction is directly aimed at lowering the level of
election observation by the Bulgarian civil society.
Part 9
Electoral campaign
Timespan of the campaign
The official campaign starts 30 days and ends two days before the Election Day. Only in the
span of the official campaign the participants have the right to popularize their cause and to
put their respective numbers in the ballot on their campaign materials. The last day before the
Election Day is called “consideration day” and any kind of propaganda on it is strictly
forbidden. It is intended so the voters could be given the opportunity to consider their choice
without outside interference.
Campaign financing
The Electoral Code set the rules on funding sources and on how much money each party,
coalition or IC could spend for the campaign.
Parties and coalitions could use their funds, accumulated in previous periods. Other sources
allowed are candidates’ personal funds and donations. The ICs could also use personal funds
of the members of the IC. Donations from legal entities are forbidden as well as anonymous
donations. One natural person could donate a maximum of 10.000 levs (about EUR 5.113).
The latter rule is in line with the general limitation on party funding through donations as one
natural person could contribute for a certain party’s other activities the same amount per year.
However there is no coherence between the electoral legislation and the legislation on
political parties so there is no clarity if one person could make a general donation to a party of
10.000 levs and then contribute another 10.000 levs specifically for the campaign. It is also
unclear if candidates’ contributions shall be treated as donations (thus being subjected to the
10.000 levs limitation) or they could be up to the maximum set for the campaign (see next
paragraph). The latter also apply to the funds contributed to the ICs by their members. Thus
the ban on funding by legal entities and the 10.000 levs limitation could easily be
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circumvented by donations first given to a candidate or a member of the IC and then the
candidate (the member of the IC respectively) to contribute the sum as personal funds.
The Electoral Code sets a maximum that each subject could spend on campaign. For the
Presidential elections that maximum is the same for all subjects, thus each party, coalition or
IC could spend no more than 2 million levs (about EUR 1.022 million).
State subsidy
In Bulgaria all parties that have received at least 1% of the votes on the last parliamentary
elections receive a state subsidy. The state subsidy is 11 levs (EUR 5.62) for each vote the
party has received. With an usual turn-out of about 3 million people voting, the minimum
state subsidy is about EUR 160.000 per year. In order to equate the opportunities, all those
parties that do not qualify for state subsidy are entitled to an electoral subsidy of 40.000 levs
(about EUR 20.450). Here we should mention that the price for the coverage by the public
state-owned Bulgarian National Television (BNTV) and Bulgarian National Radio are
determined with an act of the Council of Ministers. For the Presidential elections 2016 the
price for broadcasting 30 seconds clip in the prime-time of BNTV was set at 2.670 levs
(about EUR 1.360, VAT included) on workdays and the staggering 3.360 levs (about
EUR 1.720, VAT included) on the weekends. Usually in the private media the price is
even higher. It is difficult to determine how exactly more the private media charge for
campaign advertisement as we have not been able to find the information published (although
all media are obliged to publish the terms and conditions on their respective websites). From
unofficial sources we gather the difference to be twofold to fourfold as compared to the prices
set for the BNTV.
The electoral subsidy is granted indirectly, which is – the subject entitled to a subsidy cannot
receive the latter in cash. The rules on how the electoral subsidy is granted are set by the
CEC.
The TV media in the electoral campaign
Special attention should be paid at the regulations on the TV media in regard of their role in
the electoral campaign. The Electoral Code contains obligations on that only in regard of the
public TV station – the Bulgarian National Television. There are no detailed regulations on
private media activities for the campaign outside their obligation to provide their services at
equal prices for all electoral subjects. Both BNTV and the private TV media are not
obliged to provide any free air time for all candidates. The airing of electoral material on
BNTV has to be paid and the prices are set via a Decree of the Government. Up to the
Electoral Code of 2014 the obligations of BNTV were described in the law; however with the
Electoral Code of 2014 that description was conferred to CEC to do. Now the Code only
provides that CEC should take into account the equality of the candidates, but also their
importance. In practical terms that means that BNTV could set different debates for the
mainstream candidates and for those outside of the mainstream. Meanwhile the private TV
media function on on-invitation basis, meaning that they solely decide which of the
candidates to invite or not to invite.
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We find that the existent conditions for participation of the different candidates in TV
media coverage are in breach of the Equal Opportunity Principle. While in BNTV the
Proportional Equality part of the Principle is somewhat met, all the candidates have to
pay a fee to participate even in the BNTV and the price, set by the Government, is too
high for some candidates to participate. In the private TV media the Equal Opportunity
Principle is not met even on Proportional Equality basis and it is utterly impossible for
some candidates to gain any coverage at all in the private TV media. The lack of legal
requirements, both for BNTV and the private TV media to give some free air time to all
candidates, is in direct breach of p.20 of the Explanatory Report of the Venice
Commission Code.
Part 10
Ballots and voting
An integral white ballot paper is in use for all elections in the past 12 years. The candidates
are arranged in the ballot in accordance with a draw, preformed publicly by CEC. The names
of the candidates are printed in the respective presidential/vice-presidential pairs with the
same type of font and equal font size, notifying which candidate runs for President and which
one – for Vice President. The pairs are separated in equal distances by thick black lines. For
each pair there’s a check-box of equal size for the voters to mark. All the above applies for the
“I do not support any of the candidates” option, while the latter is printed at the bottom of the
ballot after all the pairs.
The ballots are printed in batches of 100 and each ballot has a number printed on the top and
at the lower right corner. At the back-side of the ballot there is a thick black line printed,
covering the check-boxes in order to prevent any see-through. There are also two rectangular
fields at the back-side.
The citizens cast their votes by marking the respective check-box. The marking should be
done only by blue-ink pen and only using the symbols “X” or “V”. The latter is a precaution
against a possible disclosure of the secrecy of the vote by marking the ballot with a specific
sign that could reveal who has voted how. A ballot marked in any other way is deemed
invalid.
The entire voting procedure goes as follows: 1) a member of the PSEC tears away a ballot
from the batch so the number, printed on the top shall remain with the batch; the tearing of the
ballot shall not occur if there is no voter, to which the ballot to be given; 2) the member of the
PSEC puts the stamp of the PSEC in one of the fields at the back of the ballot and hands the
ballot over to the voter; 3) the voters goes into the “dark room” (usually a small space in the
polling section, set apart by canvas) marks his/her vote and folds the ballot so the marking
cannot be seen, but the rectangular fields at the back-side and the lower-right corner to remain
accessible; 4) the voter hands back the ballot to the member of the PSEC; 5) the member of
the PESC tears away the lower-right corner and verifies by the number printed on it that the
ballot paper came from the same batch by comparing it with the number that has remained on
the batch; 6) the member of the PSEC puts away the tear corner in a special small box, stamps
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the ballot again in the second rectangular field, then hands over the ballot again to the voter;
7) the voter goes to the ballot box and after receiving permission by another member of the
PSEC, puts the ballot in the box.
The procedure described above is aimed at preventing the so called (Bulgarian jargon)
“indian-line-voting”. The latter is a felony practice in which a member of the PSEC somehow
takes a blank ballot out of the polling section and gives it to the person that is organizing a
controlled voting. That person fills in the ballot and gives it to a voter to hide it in his/hers
clothes. The voter goes in the polling station, takes a new ballot and while in the dark room,
switches the two ballots, casting the pre-filled one and taking the new blank ballot back to the
organizer of the controlled voting. Then the voter is paid although the actual payment could
be in-kind or a promise to the voter that he/she will receive some kind of benefit, e.g. more
firewood from the municipality social services. After that the process repeats.
Although created by good intentions, it is our opinion that the voting procedure is
extremely over-complicated and is unreasonably demanding – both for the members of
the PSECs and for the voters. It is in direct contradiction to both points 34 and 35 of the
Explanatory Report of the Venice Commission Code! It is also contradictory to point 32
of the same Report as it creates additional variables for PSECs to check.
Election Day
The Election Day starts at 7 a.m. and ends at 20 p.m. If at 20 p.m. there are still voters
queuing in front of the polling station to vote, the President of the PSECs should collect the
ID cards of the voters on the queue and to call them one by one to vote. No voting should take
place after 21 p.m.
Counting of the votes and the transfer of the electoral papers form PSECs to the RECs
The counting of the votes takes place in the PSECs’ premises after the Election Day is over.
Besides the members of the PSEC, partisan intercessors, non-partisan observers, candidates
and representatives of the media have the right to be present during the count. Once the
counting has started no one is allowed to enter or to exit the premises of the respective PSEC.
After the count the PSEC has to fill in a protocol with the results. There are more than 20
requisites to be filled in discounting the actual number of votes for each candidate pair and 7
confirmation check-sums. After the protocol is prepared and signed by all members of the
PSEC, all those present outside of the PSEC’s members (e.g. the electoral observers) have the
right to receive a copy of the protocol. Another copy of the protocol has to be put by the
PSEC on the outside of the PSEC’s premises. The President, the Secretary and one of the
members of the PSEC then have to go to the respective REC to hand over the protocol, the
ballots and the other electoral papers. The REC’s composing members are usually divided in
pairs, each pair being responsible to receive the electoral papers form one PSEC at a time.
It is not unusual when the protocols of the PSECs are presented at the RECs errors to
be discovered in the protocols by the REC’s members receiving the protocol. While the
Electoral Code stipulates that in such occasion a recount should be conducted by the
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REC in the presence of the PSEC’s members and after the hand over by all other PSECs
is done, the REC pair receiving the papers usually prefers to make on-the-spot
corrections. Those corrections are often arbitrary – just to make the check-sums come
true, without any verification of the papers! That practice however delays the hand over
process, which in turn leaves those PSECs’ members that are awaiting their turn
without any serious supervision (and in a state of growing annoyance) for a long periods
of time, handling the bags with the ballots and the other papers, as usually all of the
REC’s members are occupied in the process of receiving the documents and making
corrections in the incorrectly filled protocols. The bags that contain the ballots and the
other papers are not sealed in any meaningful manner!
II. THE CONDUCT OF THE 2016 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS
Part 1
Preliminary matters
The 2016 Presidential elections were called by the National Assembly under the conditions
and in the timeframe, envisaged by the Constitution and in the law. 12 parties, 5 coalitions
and 15 Initiative Committees applied for registration. Out of those, 11 parties, 5 coalitions and
11 ICs were registered. The applications of 1 party and 4 ICs were rejected. 2 ICs appealed
there rejection, however the respective decisions of CEC were both confirmed by the
Supreme Administrative Court as lawful. At the end 7 parties, 4 coalitions and 10 ICs
presented candidates for President and Vice President, thus the final figure of candidate lists
was set at 21.
Part 2
The candidates
The candidates shall be presented in their order in the ballot, determined by a draw of lots
conducted by CEC as envisaged in the law. The first name is of the candidate for President
and the second – of the candidate for Vice President.
1. Veselin Mareshki and Petar Petrov – independents
Mr. Mareshki is a Bulgarian business man from the city of Varna. His main business is in
pharmacy, owning also a drug stores chain promptly named “Mareshki Drug Stores”. He rose
to prominence after imposing a dumping policy in his drug stores, selling medicaments at
considerably lower prices than other drug stores. That gave Mr. Mareshki popularity
especially among the elderly. In 2007 Mareshki was elected municipal councilor in Varna
Municipality and was reelected on 2011 local elections. In 2015 Mareshki gained a nationwide fame after repeating his successful dumping tactics but this time in the liquid fuel
market. His petrol station in Varna saw drivers lining-up for hours to fill their tanks for a price
up to 20 euro-cents per liter lower than in other stations. Additional boost for Mr. Mareshki’s
popularity was provided by the Competition Protection Committee (CPC – an independent
state regulatory body). Early in 2016 CPC announced that it has carried an investigation of the
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largest fuel providers and the investigation discovered a cartel agreement between six
companies (including OMV Bulgaria, Shell Bulgaria and Lukoil) in the area of price-setting.
Thus Mareshki gained a charisma of a successful home-born, home-grown businessman
fighting against “the oppression” of the foreign companies in Bulgaria.
Mr. Mareshki’s Vice-Presidential candidate Petar Petrov was and remained unknown to the
larger public.
2. Velizar Enchev and Bilyana Veleva-Grancharova – Movement for Radical Change
“Bulgarian Spring” party
Mr. Enchev is a former Bulgarian diplomat and journalist. He was elected MP on 2014
General Elections from the list of the Patriotic Front Coalition. However he disagreed sharply
with the position of his parliamentary group to a support CEDB’s government, promptly
voted against the new Cabinet of Prime Minister Boyko Borisov and as a result got expelled
from the Patriotic Front. After his expulsion Enchev founded and become President of the
Movement for Radical Change “Bulgarian Spring”.
Enchev’s Vice-Presidential candidate Bilyana Veleva-Grancharova was and remained
unknown to the larger public.
3. Plamen Oresharski and Danail Papazov – independents
Mr. Oresharski fits well in the definition of professional politician and “political animal”.
From 1993 to 1997 (during the socialist governments of Prime Ministers Lyuben Berov and
Jan Videnov) Oresharski was Head of the Directorate “State Treasure and Debt” in the
Ministry of Finance. In the center-right government of Prime Minister Ivan Kostov (19972001) Mr. Oresharski was Deputy Minister of Finance. In the Tripartite Coalition between the
Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP), the former Tsar Simeon’s movement (liberal) and the
Turkish Movement for Rights and Freedoms (liberal), headed by the leader of the BSP
Sergey Stanishev (2005-2009) Oresharski was Minister of Finance. In the period 2009-2013
he was MP elected as “non-partisan” from the lists of BSP. In 2013 Oresharski was
nominated by the BSP and was elected Prime Minister of Bulgaria by the 42nd National
Assembly. One month after assuming office Oresharski nominated the highly controversial
figure of MRF’s MP Delyan Peevski for Chairman of the State Agency on National Security.
The move created an enormous public outcry, the latter forced Peevski to withdraw but the
daily protests of citizens demanding Oresharski also to resign continued for another 250 day,
well into 2014. After the failure of the large energy projects (“Belene” Nuclear Power Plant,
“South Stream” pipe line and “Burgas-Alexandrupolis” Pipe line) and the collapse of the
Central Corporative Bank (the latter defaulted in June 2014) Oresharski deposited the
resignation of his Cabinet, precipitating early General Elections.
For 2016 Presidential elections Mr. Oresharski was nominated by an IC but received and
accepted the official support of the MRF.
Oresharski’s chosen Vice-Presidential candidate Danail Papazov was Minister of Transport in
Oresharski’s Cabinet. Papazov was also candidate for mayor of Varna in 2015 Local
22
Elections from a generally unknown party “Life for Varna”. Outside of those facts Papazov is
and remained unknown to the larger public at nation-wide scale.
4. George Ganchev and Kolyo Paramov – Christian-Social Union
Mr. Ganchev is a colorful figure of the Bulgarian politics from the 90-ies of the 20th century.
In 1990 Ganchev founded the Bulgarian Business Block party. On the 1995 General Elections
the BBB gained seats in the 37th National Assembly. Few months later Ganchev’s mandate as
an MP was terminated by the Constitutional Court on grounds that he has a second (USA)
citizenship. He was elected again in 1997 and remained an MP until 2001. Ever since
Ganchev is on and off the political stage, while his last major participation in elections is in
2001 Presidential Elections, obtaining 3,36% of the vote.
Ganchev’s Vice-Presidential candidate Kolyo Paramov is prominent Bulgarian economist and
analyst.
5. Diana Dimitrova and Gabriel Gerasimov – independents
Both candidates were and remained unknown to the larger public.
6. Traycho Traykov and Sabi Sabev – Reformatory Block
Mr. Traykov was Minister of the Economy, Energy and Turism in the first Cabinet of Boyko
Borisov (2009-2013). He resigned the post in March 2012 on Borisov’s request. The official
motive for Traykov’s removal was a failed business forum in Qatar, however later journalists’
investigations traced the responsibility for the forum’s organization to the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs. It is largely speculated that Traykov was removed by Borisov because of Traykov’s
western orientation and unwillingness to bend to the energy interests of Russia in Bulgaria.
Traykov’s Vice-Presidential candidate Reserve General-Major Sabi Sabev is a former
Bulgarian high ranking officer. Since his retirement Gen. Sabev is a prominent member of
one of the political parties in the Reformatory Block coalition.
7. Biser Milanov and Krasimir Nestev – independents
Mr. Milanov, also known as “the Spot” is a controversial figure of the public life. Milanov
became known during the 2013-2014 protests against the government of Prime Minister
Plamen Oresharski when a journalist noted that Milanov can be seen (actively cheering) both
on the protest and the few pro-government rallies. That precipitated many conspiracy theories
that the government is using Milanov to infiltrate the protests in order to create provocations
and undermine the protest’s cause. Those theories were partially confirmed when Milanov
actually tried to create a provocation at one of the daily anti-government protests but was
quickly arrested by the police and later – sentenced for hooliganism.
Milanov’s Vice-Presidential candidate Krasimir Nestev was and remained unknown to the
larger public.
8. Alexander Tomov and Radoslav Radoslavov – Bulgarian Social-Democracy/Euro Left
23
Mr. Tomov is Bulgarian politician that was mostly active from 1990 to 2001. He was Deputy
Prime Minister in the Government of Dimitar Popov (1990-91), MP in the 7th Grand National
Assembly and in the 36th and 38th National Assemblies. In 1997 Tomov founded the
Bulgarian Euro Left party and in the same year the party was able to gain 14 seats in the 38th
National Assembly. Since 2001 Tomov was more active in the private sector, becoming
President of the Board of “Kremikovtsi” JSC (the largest steel production plant on the
Balkans) and after that – CEO of the CSKA Sofia professional football club. In 2011 Tomov
was sentenced to 9 years in prison on charges of illegal appropriation of 26 million levs
(about EUR 13.3 million) from “Kremikovtsi” but in 2016 was fully acquitted by the Supreme
Court of Cassation.
Tomov’s Vice-Presidential candidate Radoslav Radoslavov is a political analyst, generally
unknown to the public.
9. Yordanka Koleva and Veselin Hristov – independents
Both candidates were and remained unknown to the larger public.
10. Tatjana Doncheva and Minch Spasov – “Movemenv 21” and “National Movement for
Stability and Progress” coalition
Mrs. Doncheva was a prominent member of the Socialist Party, MP in four National
Assemblies. In 2011 she was expelled from BSP for disagreement with the leadership of the
party. The same year she created her own party – “Movement 21”.
Mincho Spasov was MP form the party of the former Tsar “National Movement for Simeon
the Second” (renamed in 2007 to National Movement for Stability and Progress) in the 39th
and the 40th National Assemblies.
11. Rumen Radev and Iliyana Yotova – independents
Reserve General-Lieutenant Rumen Radev was Chairman of the High Command of the
Armed Forces until mid-2016. In the pre-election period an attempt was made to reunify the
left, fragmented by the former Presiden Georgi Parvanov’s party “Alternative for Bulgarian
Renaissance” and Tatyana Doncheva’s “Movement 21” – both former and latter being spinoffs from the Socialist Party. When, during those negotiations, Gen. Radev requested to be
dismissed from his command and from active service the media immediately reported that the
rumors are that Radev will come as a compromise non-partisan candidate to unite the left
factions. The rumors came out true and Radev was officially proposed by Parvanov to be the
left’s candidate. But soon after BSP declared the negotiations for reunification a failure while
Radev announced that he will run as an independent. Again the rumors that Radev defected
from ABR to BSP turned to be true as the prominent actor and member of the Executive
Bureau of BSP Stefan Danailov became Chair of Radev’s IC and Socialist MEP Iliyana
Yotova was nominated as Vice President. BSP promptly declared its support for the pair.
Iliyana Yotova is long-standing Socialist politician. Her political career started as Head of the
Press Office of BSP in 1997. It is considered that she was the master-mind behind Georgi
24
Parvanov’s electoral campaign in his successful bid on the 2001 Presidential Elections. In
2005 Mrs. Yotova was elected MP and since 2007 she is a Bulgarian MEP.
12. Gospodin Tonev and Andrey Andreev – Bulgarian Democratic Society
Both candidates were and remained unknown to the larger public.
13. Ivaylo Kalfin and Ljubomir Halachev – “Kalfin for President” coalition
Mr. Kalfin is a long-standing socialist politician. In 1997, while being a MP, he left the
Socialist party in protest against the BSP decision, amidst severe economic crisis, to go to
early elections rather than try to form new government (after Prime Minister Jan Videnov
resigned in December 1996). Kalfin then joined Alexander Tomov’s “Euro Left” and got
elected in the 38th National Assembly. In 2000 Mr. Kalfin formed a party of his own – “Socaldemocrats”. The year 2005 however found him again in the ranks of BSP and he was elected
MP in the 40th National Assembly, later becoming Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of
Foreign Affairs in Sergey Stanishev’s Government (2005-2009). In 2009 Kalfin was elected
MEP. In 2011 Kalfin was BSP’s chosen candidate for the Presidential Elections, coupled with
the “heavy gun” of the Socialist Party Stefan Danailov as candidate for Vice President. Kalfin
and Danailov were able to gain second place on the first round and were defeated by a small
margin on the run-off. In 2014 Kalfin yet again left BSP to join Georgi Parvanov’s ABR party
and lead its list in the European Elections. ABR failed to win seats in the EP, however on the
early General Elections in the autumn of 2014 Kalfin was elected again in the Parliament. As
ABR joined the new coalition Government of Boyko Borisov Kalfin became Deputy Prime
Minister for a second time, this time heading the Ministry of Labor and Social Policies. In
2016 ABR decided to leave the Government and Kalfin resigned, returning to his MP seat in
Parliament. With the “high-jacking” of Rumen Radev by BSP, a crisis emerged in
“Movement 21”and in ABR, who were left without a candidate. “Movement 21” was able to
deal with it easily by nominating the party leader Tatjana Doncheva. The same move wasn’t
available for ABR however, because the party leader Georgi Parvanov has already served two
terms as President. At the end Kalfin was chosen to save ABR’s honor. In attempt to gain
more legitimacy by naming the campaign after the candidate ABR created a coalition with 6
other minor parties.
Professor Halachev is Bulgarian screenplay writer and director. He is former Provost of the
National Academy of Theatrical and Cinema Art.
14. Kamen Popov and Georgi Nedelchev – independenst
Mr. Popov became famous on the night of the Local Elections in 2015, during the last of
several incidents involving “Attack” Party President Volen Siderov committing acts of
hooliganism (Siderov waved his parliamentary immunity and after pleading guilty on the
charges of hooliganism, was sentenced to 2 years of probation). In that last incident, Siderov
went to the National Academy of Theatrical and Cinema Art, demanding to be let in to search
for some students that booed him on the streets few days early so he could speak with them.
He was denied access in the Academy premises by the security and refused to leave the
25
entrance part of the Academy’s building which caused some 100 students to gather and chant
“Please, leave our Academy alone!” for about 2 hours. At the end the police intervened taking
Siderov out of the Academy by force and arresting him. In the commotion while Siderov has
been taken away from the Academy, Kamen Popov was able to sneak behind the policemen
that were holding the already restrained Siderov. Then Popov delivered a fist-blow directly in
Siderov’s face. Popov tried to hit Siderov once again but the police intervened very fast,
apprehending Popov. As much as we know Siderov never pressed charges against Popov.
Popovs’s Vice-Presidential candidate Georgi Nedelchev was and remained unknown to the
larger public.
15. Tsetska Tsacheva and Plamen Manushev – Citizens for European Development of
Bulgaria
Mrs. Tsacheva is the first woman to become Chairperson of the National Aseembly, when
she was elected at the post in 2009 (41st National Assembly). Furthermore she will remain as
the first woman to do so twice as she was elected to the office again in 2014 (43rd National
Assembly). Her party CEDB, being a “one-man-party” (which is “the Party of Boyko
Borisov” as Borisov created the party solely on his personal charisma), had a lot of difficulty
with its presidential nomination. Although Borisov contemplated for a long time to be
personally the CEDB’s candidate, because of the implications such move could create (if
elected Borisov would have to leave the post of CEDB’s President and would have to resign
the post of Prime Minister), he decided otherwise. But with CEDB not having any other
strong figure outside of Borisov, to find a suitable candidate proved difficult. The rumors
have it that Borisov turned first to some of the most successful mayors of CEDB – those that
just one year ago were reelected with ease, but all of those refused to be Presidential
candidates. So Mrs. Tsacheva was the only possible somewhat prominent figure from CEDB.
But it was a compromise candidature and that was one of the big reasons for CEDB to score
its first electoral defeat since the formation of the party in 2007.
Reserve Vice Admiral Plamen Manushev was a high-ranking officer, former Commander of
the Navy. After he resigned his command, he became active member of CEDB in Varna
region. Since 2012 Manushev held the post of Regional Governor of Varna and later he was
elected MP in the 42nd and 43rd National Assemblies.
16. Rumen Galabinov and Vesk Voleva – independents
The curious thing about that pair of candidates is that the Vice-Presidential candidate Mrs.
Voleva is actually more popular than the Presidential candidate. Mrs. Voleva is a lawyer that
specializes in law suits against banks. This gives her prominence as a defender of the poor
who defaulted on their bank loans. Galabinov and Voleva is the only pair outside of the main
stream that really tried to make a campaign. They participated in several TV shows but with
no noticeable effect on the election outcome.
17. Krasimir Karakachanov and Javor Notev – “United Patriots” coalition
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Mr. Karakachanov is the President of the “Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization”
party (IMRO) since its creation in 1997. Although IMRO never carried substantial portion of
the vote on its own, Karakachanov has proven that he possesses an insight for making
coalitions. In 1997, just few months after IMRO’s founding, it became part of the “United
Democratic Forces” coalition and Karakachanov got elected in the 38th National Assembly. In
2005 he became MP again (40th National Assembly) in the coalition “Bulgarian National
Union”. For the 2013 General Elections Karakachanov really wanted to make coalition with
“Attack” however was refused by “Attack”’s President Volen Siderov. The 2013 elections
saw IMRO and one other major nationalistic party – the “National Front for Salvation of
Bulgaria” (NFSB) not able to achieve the 4% threshold. On 2014 European Elections
Karakachanov was able yet again to make a successful coalition with Nikolay Barekov’s
“Bulgaria without Censorship”. BwC coalition scored 10.7% and gained 2 seats out of 17 in
EP, one of which was taken by IMRO’s Vice President Angel Dzhambazki. But when the
Government of Prime Minister Plamen Oresharski collapsed in the summer of 2014 and early
elections were called in the autumn, Karakachanov decided that IMRO’s fortunes reside in a
coalition with NFSB. Yet dgdin it was a successful move and Karakachanov got elected for
his third mandate as MP in the 43rd National Assembly. For the Presidential Elections
however Karakachanov was able to do his masterpiece up to date, taking “Attack” party on
board too, to create the “United Patriots” coalition. It was not an easy move as NFSB and
“Attack” have been sworn enemies, always at odds – their leaders screaming and shouting
slurs and insults at each other at every opportunity; pressing charges and law suits and even,
each alleged incidents with physical violence between their supporters. So when the formation
of the UP coalition was announced, it precipitated a host of comments that it is immoral –
those enemies, each sworn to destroy the other now to form a coalition obviously driven by
their narrow political interests than by the common good.
Mr. Notev is a prominent Bulgarian lawyer. He was elected MP in 2009, 2013 and 2014 (41st,
42nd and 43rd National Assemblies); Vice President of the 42nd and 43rd National Assemblies.
Since 2012 Notev is also Vice President of “Attack” party.
18. Kemil Ramadan and Momchil Dobrev – Balkan Democratic League
Both candidates were and remained unknown to the larger public.
19. Plamen Paskov and Svetozar Saev – independents
Both candidates were and remained unknown to the larger public.
20. Dimitar Marinov and Radoslav Petov – Bulgarian National Unification
Dimitar “Mityo The Gun” Marinov is a popular figure. His popularity stems from his
unconstrained behavior and funny language. In the last 10 years Marinov participated in
several reality-shows that made his name known to the larger public. In the campaign
Marinov played the comedian type, satirically exposing one of the electoral phenomenons of
the past years – the distribution of food during every electoral rally. He boldly promised that
anyone who votes for him will get free meatballs and “kebabches” (elongated meatballs) and
27
also freshly baked bread. Marinov’s participation in the campaign brought colorfulness to the
election, winning him both praises and curses from the public.
Marinov’s Vice-Presidential candidate Radoslav Petrov was and remained unknown to the
larger public.
21. Nikolaj Banev and Sali Ibryam – independents
Mr. Banev is a prominent businessman. In his youth Mr. Banev worked on different
administrative positions in the Communist Party’s Youth Committee. After the fall of the
regime Banev created one of the first investment funds in Bulgaria and with it he participated
in the mass privatization in Bulgaria that started in the mid-90ies. Mr. Banev’s fund acquired
many of the industries that were put on auction during the mass privatization. According to
his Wikipedia page his fortune is estimated to be more than EUR 500 million in different
assets.
Mr. Ibryam was a candidate for President during the 2011 Presidential elections.
Part 3
The electoral campaign
The electoral campaign was dull and apathetic. The most prominent candidates made
campaign mainly through distribution of leaflets, using internet to broadcast their
advertisement videos, participating in TV debates and holding in-the-closed meetings. The
outside of the mainstream candidates did not made any noticeable public appearance, with
only one exception and that is Dimitar “Mityo the Gun” Marinov, who got the media and
public attentions with his somewhat scandalous (or just comedy-like) promise of free
meatballs and bread for his voters. Not one of the candidates held any in-the-open public
rallies.
Part 4
Election Day
Both election days (6th of November for the first round and 13th of November for the second)
went generally smoothly without any major incidents. The only point of tension during the
first round, that was reported, was in the polling stations in Turkey where representatives of
the local emigrants’ organizations helped the voters that do not speak Bulgarian to fill the
necessary forms. As that was happening inside of the premises where the polling stations were
located, several Chairpersons of PSECs asked the representatives of the emigrants’
organizations to leave the premises, as the Electoral Code stipulates that all electoral business
have to be conducted in the official language – Bulgarian. No voter with correctly filled forms
however was denied the right to vote.
Part 5
Counting of the votes and determining the results
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As the presidential elections are the simplest ones in regard of counting the votes and
determining the results, there were no incidents in that regard. All electoral subjects
participating in the election accepted the official results as declared by the CEC on both
rounds of the elections. No complain on the legality of the 2016 Presidential Elections was
raised in front of the Constitutional Court.
III. EVALUATION OF THE ELECTIONS
Part 1
Electoral legislation
The Electoral Code was amended multiple times within the 1 year time-frame envisaged in
the Venice Commission Code. Those amendments concerned serious basic maters like the
right to vote and the electoral system. In that regard it is our opinion that the 2016 Presidential
Elections in Bulgaria do not meet the standards set in the Venice Commission Code –
p.II.2 b) of the Guidelines of the Code in particular. The many controversies related to the
amendments, even those of the latter that could not be considered related to fundamental
elements of the electoral legislation, contravene the general recommendations of the Code that
no step should be taken that could discredit the democratic nature of the election in the eyes of
the broad public.
Part 2
Freeness of the elections
Although some issues exist, especially in regard of the collection of signatures during the
registration procedure, as addressed in Section I, Part 7 of the present report, our general
evaluation is that the 2016 Presidential Elections were free. It is our opinion that the
registration procedure could be made more democratic and should be streamlined or at least
be made more transparent. However the sheer number of candidate pairs that were registered
and only the few pairs that did not, shows that the flaws in the procedure were not used for
foul play.
Part 3
Fairness of the elections
With deep regret we must conclude that the 2016 Presidential Elections cannot be deemed
fair. The unfairness arises from several issues, described in detail in Sections I and II of this
report that we will summarize in short here:
1) The immense disparity in state funding of the parties represented in Parliament and those
that are not, coupled with the cap on donations, the latter serving more as a disadvantage for
the non-state-funded parties than as an equalizer of the opportunities, creates an environment,
in which equal opportunity is virtually absent even in the sense of proportional equality
as described in the Venice Committee Code.
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2) Both the public and the private electronic media are not obliged to give any free air time to
any of the electoral subjects. The latter reinforces the existing inequality that arises from
the funding issue.
3) The rules on funding limitations can be called at best unclear. The latter creates
opportunities for foul play by the large parties that receive state funding anyway.
4) The absolute decimation of non-partisan electoral observation represents a major set-back.
The organizations of the civil society, except handful mainstream associations, now virtually
do not have an access to official observer status. The reduction of transparency inevitably
compromises in a certain degree the fairness of an election.
To our conclusion that the elections were not fair, we can add the statement of former Prime
Minister Ivan Kostov (1997-2001) who said in an interview for BiT TV station on 23rd of
February 2017 that (the notes in square parenthesis are ours) “The elections in Bulgaria are
relatively unfair. That relativity is different, depends on who is governing. There is a
[portion of the] vote that is motivated not by political reasons, but by work-related
proposals, social benefits or a scholarship for the children [of the voter] to study in
Europe, [and that serves as a motivation] for those people that are not politically
motivated.”
Part 4
Conclusions
Our conclusion is that in Bulgaria there is democratic deficiency mainly in the fairness side of
the electoral process. That deficiency is due to imperfections in the electoral legislation. As
we like to have proactive approach, we shall give some de lege ferenda recommendations in
Section V of the report, that we believe could have the ability to rectify many of the electoral
issues existing in Bulgaria.
IV. POLITICAL EVALUATION
The 2016 Presidential elections brought to CEDB its first electoral defeat on nationwide elections since the party was established in 2007. In early October, right before the start
of the electoral campaign, the Prime Minister Borisov declared that if CEDB loses the
election, his Government will resign. It was considered that Borisov aimed at mobilizing
CEDB’s supporters to vote under the threat that if the elections are lost, CEDB’s government
will be seen out of office. However the Borisov’s move seems to have had the exactly
opposite effect or at least the opposite effect was far more extensive than the effect on the
original aim. Borisov’s promise to resign seems to have stimulated the voters that were
dissatisfied with his rule to vote for Rumen Radev, even those that are generally politically
right-minded and did not liked Radev in general.
After Radev’s election Borisov promptly resigned and the incumbent President
Plevneliev conducted the mandatory procedure – the attempt a new Cabinet to be formed by
the acting Parliament. After the latter procedure failed in late December 2016 and as the
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outgoing President does not have the right to dissolve the Parliament, it was up to Plevneliev
to appoint a care-take Cabinet. Plevneliev proposed the President-elect Radev to nominate the
care-take ministers and Plevnaliev to only sanction them while still in office so there will be
no need for Radev, after assuming office, to appoint a new Government. Radev however
refused the offer, the latter prompting Plevneliev to refuse to appoint a care-take Cabinet at
all. Finally, after assuming office on 23rd of January 2017, Radev dissolved the 43rd National
Assembly, appointed a care-take Cabinet headed by Prime Minister Prof. Ognyan Gerdzhikov
(former President of the National Assembly – 2001-2005) and called early General Elections
on 26th of March.
In conclusion, nevertheless that the President in Bulgaria do not hold much power, as
it is normal for a parliamentary republic, it is obvious that the Presidential Elections could
have big political significance. The 2016 Elections, and more specifically the loss of the
election by the major governing party, precipitated a political crisis, the latter resulting in the
resignation of the Government and the early dissolution of the Parliament. The importance of
the Presidential Elections is further reinforced by the fact that more often (3 out of 5 elections
since 1991, discounting the first Presidentals, as they were conducted simultaneously with the
first Parliamentary Elections) an oppositional candidate has been elected (in 1996, 2001 and
2016). That is why it could be determined that politically the Presidental Elections are the
second most important type of elections after the Parliamentary Elections and as such their
democratic conduct is of big importance.
V. DE LEGE FERENDA RECOMMENDATIONS
Part 1
Constitutional legal basis
Nevertheless it is well known that the Venice Commission standards stipulate that the
electoral legislation should not be amended in its fundamental elements at least one year prior
to the upcoming elections, that standard was never observed and the 2016 Presidential
Elections, as explained in detail above in the present report, are not an exception. Thus our
recommendations, based on p.II.2.b of the Venice Commission Code, are:
1) Adoption of a Constitutional amendment to prohibit any changes in the electoral
legislation done less than one year prior to an upcoming election, or the amendments to
the electoral legislation to enter into force not for the upcoming elections, but for the
next elections after.
2) Adoption of a Constitutional amendment to create a special status for the electoral
law. Under that special status the amendments to the electoral legislation shall be
carried by some kind of qualified majority. Our concrete recommendation is for a
qualified majority of more than a half of all Members of Parliament (121 votes out of
240) and a majority of three fifths of the Members of Parliament voting but more than a
half of all MPs – when overcoming a Presidential veto, in case such a veto has been
enforced.
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Part 2
Recommendations regarding the Electoral Code
To address the issues that were described mainly in Section I of this report, we would like to
make the following de lege ferenda recommendations for amendments in the Electoral Code:
1) The final deadline for fixing the date of the elections should be set earlier. Our
concrete proposal is that the date of the elections should be fixed not later than 90 days
(about 3 months) prior to Election Day (as compared to 60 days now). This will reinforce
the Equal Opportunity principle by giving the smaller parties more time to prepare,
especially with regard to those legal requirements that cannot be satisfied prior to the
fixing of the date (e.g. the collection of the signatures). This will give the smaller parties
also the possibility to negotiate and make coalitions more easily.
2.1) The limitation that one voter could sign in support of the registration of only one
electoral subject should be abolished. That measure will have a two-dimensional positive
effect – first, it will equalize the opportunities for registration between larger and
smaller parties and ICs and that in turn will extend the Freedom of the voters to express
their wishes.
2.2) In general it is our opinion that the list-of-the-signatories requirement is too
restricting and the procedure of checking the validity of the signatures is too nontransparent. The full abolition of the latter requirement could be considered, while
increasing the ammount of the monetary deposit required for the registration.
3) The possibility for all non-profit legal entities (associations and foundations alike) to
obtain official status as electoral observers shall be reintroduced. The requirement that
the non-profits should be dully registered as such operating in public (as opposed to in
private) interest could be maintained without prejudice to the non-profit’s concrete
goals.
4) The constitution of RECs and PSECs should be organized on a semi-professional
basis. The latter may include many possible measures, e.g. the creation of a register of
those persons that have had experience as members of electoral committees or that have
undergone trainings, organized by the CEC not only prior to but also between elections.
The composition of the RECs and the PSECs should be open to participation by nonpartisan persons. Within the mentioned register a “black list” of persons punished for
incompetent actions done while serving as members of PSECs in previous elections
should be established. The latter persons should not be allowed to participate in the
composition of electoral committees.
5) The rules on campaign financing should be clarified. A clear distinction but also a
clear relation should be established between the financial contributions to the general
activities of the parties under the Political Parties Act (outside of electoral periods) and
such contributions made especially for the purposes of the electoral campaigns under
the rules of the Electoral Code. More exact rules should be provided in the Electoral
32
Code regarding the use of candidates’ and members’ of ICs own funds in campaign
financing.
6) Rules on the setting of the prices that the public electronic media providers (namely
the Bulgarian National Television and the Bulgarian National Radio) charge for the
presentation of the electoral subjects during the campaign should be clearly and
precisely written in the Electoral Code (as opposed to the present situation where those
prices are set via an act of the Council of Ministers). The latter measure is necessary as a
guarantee against the Government setting unreasonably high prices preventive towards
the lesser electoral subjects and towards oppositional parties. It should be explicitly
stated in the Electoral Code that the prices charged by the public electronic media shall
be exempt from VAT taxation.
7) A minimal amount of free-of-charge air time should be granted to all electoral
subjects participating in the elections in both public and private electronic media. If this
measure is implemented, then the campaign subsidy could be abolished.
8) The voting procedure should be considerably simplified as of now it is absolutely
contradictory to the requirements of the Venice Commission Code. The general
abolishment of the use of paper ballots and its replacement with machine voting will be
an excellent solution to the problem.
9) The Electoral Code should prescribe that sealable plastic boxes should be used for the
transferring of the ballots and the electoral paper between the PSECs and the RECs.
Those boxes should replace the non-sealable canvas bags that are now in use.
10) When a certain REC finds error(s) in a PSEC’s protocol with the results of the vote,
the respective protocol should not be corrected on the spot. Instead the box with the
ballots, the protocol and the other papers should be resealed by the REC and set aside
for additional check later. This measure will streamline the process of the hand-over of
the electoral papers from the PSECs to the RECs, decreasing the time necessary for the
hand-over and the possibility the electoral papers to be mishandled. It will also allow the
subsequent check to be performed in much calmer environment and under the
supervision of more or even all of the REC’s members. Then a much more accurate
assessment could be made by the REC if the errors are accidental, are due to
incompetence or negligence, or due to fraud. After the latter assessment the REC could
invoke administrative sanctions or to refer the cases to the respective Prosecution Office
for further investigation.
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