site.btaUPDATED Paper Ballots Only to Be Used in October 29 Local Elections

Bulgaria's Central Election Commission (CEC) on Friday voted, 12-2, to decide that only paper ballots will be used at the October 29 local elections and a possible second round of voting on November 5.

CEC reasoned its decision by the impossibility to equip voting sections with devices certified by a decision of the Ministry of Electronic Governance, the Bulgarian Institute of Metrology and the Bulgarian Institute for Standardization, which is a mandatory condition set by the Election Code for the use of machine voting.

The Commission said that it had received a letter from Yolovski to the effect that a decision certifying the devices had not been issued yet.

The proposal came from CEC member Emil Voinov, who said that information from the State Agency for National Security was received on October 26 in connection with the proposal made on the manner of voting.

Another member, Tsvetozar Tomov, suggested that Electronic Governance Minister Alexander Yolovski be given two hours until 10 p.m. to say whether compliance of the machine-voting devices with the requirements of the Election Code and the technical specification will be certified.

Tomov noted that the problem is that "CEC found itself in the position of an institution which subjugates its decisions to the will of sundry political factors" and that he cannot agree with that.

"This was a very difficult decision because I have always backed machine voting as a voting method. What matters most is to trust the balloting process and any action, no matter who takes it, which breeds distrust and puts off voters, must be blocked," said CEC Chair Kamelia Neykova. In her words, "precisely by this decision CEC succeeded in minimizing risks of preventing voters from going to the polls." She insisted that CEC had nothing to do with "today's shameful situation".

Non-governmental organizations that are part of the Public Council with CEC issued a position saying that "the public tensions triggered by machine voting breed distrust of the balloting process."