Nenad Rassic: Elections in the Legal North Without Serbian List Attendance

Elections in the country's four northern municipalities are considered legal and legitimate even without Serb List participation. Thus, they have disclosed to Radio Kosovo the connoisseur of the election processes and leaders of Serbian political parties in Kosovo. Minister for Community and Return Nenad Rassic said any results of the elections to be held would be legitimate and legal.

In this case I know legitimacy doesn't interfere with legality. Theoretically it hasn't happened so far. But with one vote the candidate for president to go out and vote has the legality of”, Rassic has said.

The recognition of constitutional law -- at the same time former head of the Central Election Commission, Mazum Baraliu -- tells Radio Kosovo that it is not legally seen participating in a certain percentage in elections to be considered legitimate.

The other thing is how much democracy exists and how much involvement there is in that election if some of the citizens who trust the Serbian List do not go out to vote or boycott the elections. So, no matter how much they get to the percentage there, elections will be held and can be handled legitimate and legalally”, Baraliu stressed.

Little by contrast, the election processes connoisseur from the Kosovo Democratic Institute, Eugen Cakoli, who estimates that Kosovo has been in the same situation before 2013.

He told Kosovo Radio that previous experiences have shown us that due to minor election appearance in the northern part, they have not been able to exercise their mandate due to contesting electoral legitimacy.

Kosovo has been in such a situation before 2013, so when in the northern part of the country, exit to elections has been in single digits. And as a result, the elected institutions, although formally not able to exercise their mandate in practice because of their debacle of the legitimacy of the election process”, Chakoli has been expressed.

The extraordinary elections for the heads of four municipalities in the country's north, as well as for municipal municipalities in Leposaviq and Zvecan, which were announced to be held on December 18th last year, have been postponed with President Vjosa Osmani's decision, following Western partners' demands. The Serbian list had refused to participate in this election. It was a warning that even Serbian voters would not respond to voter turnout. The Central Election Commission says it has already set deadlines for activities, as well as adopted the operational plan for organising the 23 April elections.