Failure to respect the legal deadlines may violate the electoral standards

Tirana May 25, 2005

 Albanian Helsinki Committee confirms with regret and concern that the excessive delayed establishment of the ELC-s as well as the fact that the 18 ELC-s have not been constituted yet, throws doubt into the normal proceeding of the further electoral process.

There is one week left from the deadline when the MP candidates should submit ELC-s the relevant documentation for their registration.

Submission and the review of this documentation in the conditions of lack of training or a formal and non-qualitative training of the ELC-s can delay and compromise this process as well.

Under the law, ELC is compelled to validate the accuracy of any data that this documentation contains and turn them back for further fulfillment if they lack data.

In this respect AHC considers the content of the article 80 of the Electoral Code where it is stated that: ‘The MP candidates of the political parties as well as the independent candidates that do not hold term of offices in the parliament, are obliged to attach to the above information a list with the signatures of 300 electors that reside in that constituency and whose names appear on the preliminary lists of the electors of that constituency.

 AHC shares the opinion that ELC-s shall validate the accuracy of the data and shall not justify with the arguments ‘there is not enough time’, ‘we’re late’ etc.

The same thing is true for the non-parliamentary parties that are registered as electoral subjects at CEC and that are obliged in this case to submit a list of candidates for 40 parliamentary seats. This list shall be supported by the signatures of 7000 voters registered in the electors’ preliminary lists.

AHC considers as necessary that as regards this issue there must be reference to that part of the Code of Good Conduct for the Elections, adopted by the Venice Convention which states: ‘ The signature verification procedure shall be done based on clear rules, especially  on those related to the deadlines and shall be applicable to all the signatures’ (see translation Albanian pg 17)

AHC is convinced that ELC members can successfully achieve their duties if they consider law as the highest authority, if they are trained through testing as OSCE/ODIHR and Venice Commission, if in carrying out their functions they appear to be impartial and transparent. To this end the understanding on the part of all the electoral subjects is also sought for as well as the implementation on their part of the deadlines and requirements provided for in the Electoral Code.

AHJC considers the rigorous enforcement of the law as crucial element that guarantees the achievement of the standards in the parliamentary or local elections.

The electoral campaign officially starts on June 3, 2005. There is still possibility to fix some of the identified gaps. If there is political will, the further obstacle can be overcome and the election of July, 3 of this year can be an confirmation that we know how to hold fair, honest and uncontested elections.