By the financial aid of the German Embassy, the British Embassy and the Embassy of Netherlands as well as the European Union, the Georgian Young Lawyers’ Association implemented monitoring of the local elections in Tbilisi, Kutaisi and Batumi. The report concerns violations and activities carried out during the polling day.
GYLA identified following problems during the local self-government elections:
- Gaps in the voters’ register – on the polling stations where GYLA had observers, majority of citizens could not find themselves in the voters’ register. On some polling stations deceased persons were found in the list, while majority of actual voters who have not received voter’s invitation card failed to find the relevant polling station since the borders of the polling stations were altered.
- Incompetence of the members of election districts - caused procedural violations (putting of the special envelope in the ballot box with delay; violation of the principles of filling in the election record book; violation of the rules of votes’ calculation and filling in of the Summary Protocol of Voting and Election Results);
- Deliberate illegal action from the side of Election Administration, that was partially prevented by the superior commissions. (for instance signing and sealing of the Summary Protocol of Voting and Election Results in advance by the members of the commission);
- Problems caused by presence of unauthorized persons on the polling stations- presence of more than one representative from the same election subject;
- Policemen at the polling stations- Presence of the policemen in a polling station and nearby territory without instruction of the chairman of the commission to do so;
- Problems pertaining to IDPs’ suffrage – failure to present IDP certificate together with an ID card;
- Technical deficiencies: defective copy and marking control machines; insufficient registration tables and voting booths;
- Deficiencies in legislation, that caused interpretation of legislative norms in a various way in different election precincts (for instance: persons authorized to be present in a polling station; agitation on the nearby territory to polling stations; voting procedures for IDPs, military servants, pre-trail detainees.)
The fact that in majority of election precincts chairmen of the commission did not refrain from receiving and registering observers’ complaints may be considered as a positive step.
Aforementioned violations are significant. It should also be emphasized, that the scale of identified violations was not so big as to influence legitimacy of the elections.
GYLA is going to prepare and publicize the final monitoring report in the nearest future.
Observation Mission
Pre-Election Campaign
