CRTA: Belgrade election result S dealt with citizens' will

The outcome of local elections in Belgrade does not reflect the free will of voters living there, due to the scale and kind of electoral abuse during the vote in Belgrade on 17 December, Serbian election observer CRTA praised on Monday.

Rasa Nedeljkov, CRTA director, said during a media conference Monday that the observer mission is very concerned about the quality of parliamentary elections, praising that drastic violations of voters' rights, law and institutions have escalated on election day.

“There have been irregularities in five percent of the parliamentary polling locations and even in nine percent of the polling stations for Belgrade, which has directly compromised the election results at those polling”, Nedeljkov said.

Nedeljkov stressed that in the afternoon and evening hours of election day, there has been a “tension of the apparent increase in the number of prepaid ballot papers, and the illegal presence of third parties at those locations, especially in Belgrade”.

“Also, by the end of the day in Belgrade, the number of deployments where cases of signing someone on the voter list instead of a voter have tripled compared to the first half of the day”, Nedeljkov underlined.

The locations, Nedelkov adds, are closed in circumstances of disturbing growth in the number of cases of keeping parallel evidence in and out of place, organised voter behaviour and suspicious flow of cars around the polls.

“under these conditions, the legitimacy of every future local election party will be just as suspicious if institutions do not commit to proving the truth and responsibility for the violation and bypass of the law and the collapse of the legitimacy of the” elections, Nedeljkov said.

On Sunday, media reported on numerous buses bringing people from the entity of Republika Srpska from Bosnia and Herzegovina. Some of them, unaware that they were talking to journalists, said they had come to vote.

When asked why they do not perform civic duty in their homeland, they do not have the day to respond.

CRTA's recommendations to authorities in Serbia are for the prosecution to impartially investigate accusations of criminal acts in elections and election campaigns, as well as to amend the law on local elections, so that the right to vote in local elections can only be won by taking residence for six months.

According to Nedeljkov, it is necessary to make the voter list more transparent, publishing the data for the number of voters for households.

CRTA also recommended that the Ministry of State Administration and Local Self-government conduct an independent audit of the voter list in line with recommendations from the ODIHR mission and international standards, as well as that swimmers are entrusted with the exclusive authority to verify voter supporters' signatures in the running process. / REL