The head of the Central Election Commission (CEC) said on Friday that polling stations are ready for Sunday’s elections despite the pandemic and that he is concerned about information of fraud such as “trading within election commissions” but that the CEC can only pass such information over to relevant authorities.
Amid increased numbers of coronavirus infected in the country, polling stations in Bosnia and Herzegovina will open at 7 a.m. and will close at 7 p.m. on Sunday, November 15, when voters will be electing mayors and members of local assemblies.
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Authorities have called for caution and respect of prescribed pandemic-related measures. The polling stations will be regularly disinfected and voters will be required to keep a two-meter distance and wear masks.
“It is clear to all of us that for the first time in history, elections are held amid a pandemic, which is a huge challenge for all participants in the election process. In June, the CEC adopted instructions on how to act on election day in a pandemic,” said CEC President, Zeljko Bakalar, adding that those instructions regulate the activities of the local election commissions amid the pandemic and that disinfectants are provided at nearly all polling stations.
Meanwhile, the ‘Coalition for Free and Fair Elections – Pod lupom’ (Under the Magnifying Glass) said on Friday that it has registered 1,245 irregularities of various kinds in the 2020 local election process between September 7 and November 8.
Most of those irregularities refer to premature, prohibited election campaigning, the participation of officials in campaigns, abuse of public resources and trading within local election commissions.
Local election commissions responsible for the voting process are composed of representatives of parties running for posts but independent observers have noticed that a number of new, small parties were registered whose members then got seats at local election commission and are selling them to bigger parties.
Pod Lupom registered 77 cases of trade.
“Drastic examples were noticed in Zvornik, where all or most of the members of at least 15 of the 87 election commissions come from the SNSD (Alliance of Independent Social Democrats),” said project coordinator Dario Jovanovic.
“Or in Stanari, where 39 political actors registered for elections on less than 8,000 voters, which points to fake political actors whose goal is to trade their places in election commissions,” Jovanovic said.
The election watchdog also noticed numerous cases of votes being bought for 50 to 150 Bosnian Marks.
A number of political entities have redirected their campaign activities to social networks and other audiovisual tools for political promotion. Also, pre-election political rallies were recorded contrary to all recommendations to prevent the spread of coronavirus, without reactions from the authorities or sanctions.
Pod lupom submitted its findings to the CEC about early campaigning, misuse of personal data for voting per mail, trading with election commission seats, voter buying as well as other violations.
