This became clear from the words of the director of “Transparency without borders” Kalin Slavov to Nova TV.
“The question of why the ballots are invalid has always stood before both the expert community and politicians. I want to return to a call that we make periodically, practically every election, to the Central Electoral Commission – to allow access to the stored ballots from the relevant election. Ever since 2019, when there was a big peak in the number of invalid ballots, which in some places was over 25%, the expert community has been demanding access to these ballots. It is about revising the election results. I repeat this every time. It is about seeing the purely technical reasons why ballots become invalid. The Central Election Commission stubbornly refuses such access,” he stressed.
He reminded the members of the SEC that they are officials within the framework of their electoral commitments and as such bear criminal responsibility within the meaning of the Criminal Code.
“And they should also be reminded, in my opinion, or omitted in the process of their training, of the set of crimes that they commit in this way, somehow changing the vote of the citizens”, emphasized Slavov.
The issue of the number of invalid ballots is particularly sensitive, given the scandalous DANS report that prompted the Central Election Commission to abolish machine voting for the first round of the local vote. Subsequently, the Supreme Administrative Court overruled it, and so in tomorrow’s runoff, voting will be mixed – both by machines and by paper.
Data on crimes after the first round of local elections, related to tampering with ballots, crossing out preferences, adding protocols, appeared in a number of settlements. Footage from the CCTV during the counting of the ballots revealed shocking things. In some places, requests have already been made to cash out the results.
