Election monitoring

On March 27^th 2013, Wednesday, at 12 o’clock at BTA Press Club, Tsarigradsko Shosse № 49, a discussion was carried out on "Elections 2013 - The framework of Electoral Law - Another Test for Bulgarian Democracy". A team of lawyers from ISI presented the report "Elections 2013 – a test for the new changes in the Election Code". The analysis of the changes in the electoral legislation and the problems associated with it was part of the activities within the general framework of "Civil Observers for Monitoring - Fair Elections 2013". They will continue with media monitoring and observation on the Election Day.

The report of the group of young lawyers focuses on the basic and most significant for the principles of electoral law changes, made in February 2013. It includes comments on the texts, governing the election administration, and the possibility to appeal its decisions. It also covers the topic of the lack of synchronization of the deadlines, provided for in the Constitution of the Republic of Bulgaria and the Election Code. There are clarifications on the registers of supporters and observers, as well as on the technical preparation for the early parliamentary elections.

Additional comments are made on texts that have not been changed, despite the recommendations of international observers and organizations such as the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). These are the texts related to the admistrative removal of voters from the electoral rolls, the role of national media in the election campaign, the retry of the experimental electronic voting.

The discussion involved Katya Koleva, Chairman of ISI and a project manager of the project; as well as Tereza Stancheva and Veronika Delibaltova - part of ISI’s team of layers. Representatives of other NGOs interested in the topic also took part with introductory theses: Antoaneta Tsoneva - Chairman of the "Institute for Public Environment Development", and Kalin Slavov - Executive Director of "Transparency without Boundaries" Association.

Programme of the event