The Observation Mission of Promo-LEX Association for the May 20 new mayoral elections identified deficiencies at the start of the voting process. The Mission’s head Pavel Postica told a news conference that the observers of Promo-LEX determined that some of the polling places were opened earlier than 7am or later and that persons were unjustifiably present inside or ourside polling places. It also detected cases of transportation of voters to the polling place, IPN reports.
Pavel Postica said that 26 polling places were opened before 7am, 325 at 7am, while 24 between 7:01am and 7:15am. Observers’ first findings showed that the ballots in 15 polling places weren’t sealed up correspondingly. The members of the electoral bureaus argued they didn’t get sufficient seals. At another 11 polling places, electoral posters were identified nearby.
In at least five polling places, the ballots given to the electoral bureaus exceeded 3,000, which is the legal ceiling per polling place.
In 15 cases, unauthorized persons were present in polling places or outside them. At polling place No. 16/43 of Jora de Mijloc village, two persons presented themselves as observers of an election runner and entered the polling place without having appropriate permits. They installed filming equipment and started to film the electoral process. The members of the electoral bureau suspended the voting process for 10 minutes to decide if the persons should or should not be present inside the polling place and, even if the majority was against, the persons anyway remained there. In the same village, voters were illegally transported to the polling place by a vehicle.
The ballots are mainly kept in safe conditions, but at 42 polling places these seem to be kept in an unsafe place, according to the observers. The automated information system “Elections” at many polling places worked with pauses and technical glicthes that were mainly caused by the poor Internet connection. The observers of Promo-LEX noticed that the voters at two polling places in Chisinau establsihed that unknown persons were registered as dwellers at their domicile. An observer at polling place No. 1/27 photographed the ballot.
Promo-LEX delegated 375 static observers to monitor each of the polling places and mobile observers to supervise the situation outside the polling places.
New local mayoral elections on May 20 are held in Chisinau and Balti municipalities, in Leuseni commune of Hancesti district, in Nemteni village of Hancesti district, in Jora de Mijloc commune of Orhei district, in Volovita village of Soroca district and in Parlita commune of Ungheni district. The main voter rolls for the new mayoral elections include 749 272 people. In the municipality of Chisinau, there are 631 678 voters.
