Asen Vasilev, Kalina Konstantinova and Delyan Dobrev arrived late to support theirs
A midnight marathon in the Legal Committee passed electoral code amendments for a second reading after nearly 18 hours sitting with lots of drama, pauses and food delivered for MPs just before midnight.
The line committee returned the paper ballot, rendered the machines meaningless and agreed that the composition of the CEC should change after each parliamentary vote.
The possibility of creating a “Foreigner” neighborhood in the future has been cut short. Bulgarians abroad will only have a section if at least 100 voting applications have been submitted in advance. 40 are now wanted.
In total, around 100 new election rule proposals were seen in the dark by commission members.
The dark polling halls remain in history after a majority of GERBs, BSPs and DPSs, with the support of other parties, replaced them with screens. It happened close to midnight, 10 hours into the legal committee meeting, which began early Wednesday afternoon. It finished at dawn on Thursday.
At GERB’s suggestion, there will also be special paper for ballot papers from machines. It should be different for each choice. The DB has highlighted that if there is a coincidence of several types of vote, for example presidential and parliamentary, the typographies and paper are the same and this cannot happen. Desislava Atanasova suggested correcting the idea that the card was different for each choice.
The names of the technicians who service specific machines will also be published on the CEC website.
Otherwise, shortly after the breakup, the ex-minister of e-government Bozhidar Boyanov, who left the legal commission, was replaced by another member of the cabinet “Petkov” – ex-deputy prime minister Asen Vasilev and his colleague Kalina Konstantinova. Among the reinforcements for GERB was another former minister and current deputy – Delyan Dobrev. And ironically, Vassilev also demanded that printers, warehouse workers, security guards and delivery workers – “absolutely everything that touches boards” be uploaded to the CEC website as soon as the names of the machine technicians are published. However, his editorial was not accepted by the committee.
The closure of the “Chuzbina” constituency option was confirmed with an explicit text proposed by GERB. According to Radomir Cholakov, first we need to get to know people abroad – to be clear about where they are, what they are doing, “their children are Bulgarians” and then create such a region. Hamid Hamid of DPS pointed out that there are around 2 million people overseas and there should be several regions and maybe 80 mandates. And he asked which region of Bulgaria they were going to get them from. The idea also emerged in the debate of having an amendment to the Civil Registration Law that would give the GRAO access to the Ministry of the Interior’s matrices.
The PP’s idea that a candidate should be registered in only one constituency, and not in two, as is currently the case, has not passed. DB did not accept its partners’ argument that it is a vote change for someone to stand as a candidate, be elected, but then refuse to be a deputy from the respective region.
15 minutes after 1am, the 12 members of the DPS, GERB and BSP refused to end the committee meeting and continue another day. After the short break that followed, the three representatives of “Vazrazhdane” left the commission.
Another objection in the commission was caused by the fact that with the changes the machines will no longer show the number of voters, and GERB specified that this will be clarified by the signatures on the electoral rolls. Asen Vasilev asked what if there are 150 ballots from one machine and 100 people voted according to a list and warned that machines converted into printers have no protection: the number of ballots printed is unclear, they have no clippings and serials numbers such as paper ballots, etc. no.
Only one member of the commission will count the ballots, under the supervision of the other members.
Before that – at 21.00 on Wednesday, GERB, DPS and BSP accepted the return of the paper ballot and made automated voting meaningless.
The three formations of the so-called “paper vote” coalition supported the initial proposal of the socialists in the sections with more than 300 voters to vote not only with machines, but also with paper ballots, as was the case in April last year. The minor sections will continue to vote only on paper, as is the case now.
In parallel with this, the commission made the use of the machines unnecessary: at GERB’s suggestion, the commission agreed that the receipts from the voting machines should be treated as ballots and counted, and not that the data of the devices. Furthermore, the recording and electronic transmission of automatic voting data is eliminated. Thus, the machines become printers: they print a hand-painted “ballot” instead of recording the vote.
BGN 100 million was given for the purchase of the machines.
The DPS proposal to no longer use the current voting machines was not accepted. This also didn’t go well with the PP for the separate sections where you only vote with devices.
Before that, yesterday the commission closed the Public Council of the CEC, which includes the non-governmental organizations that have been monitoring the transparency of the vote in our country for years. The Council was established in 2014.
It was also decided that the composition of the CEC would change after each parliamentary vote to reflect parliamentary representation. To this end, the commission is composed of 25 members. So even for the next election, when there will be, “Vazrazhdane” and “Bulgarian Rise” will be able to nominate their own people to the commission.
