The court in Dobrich re-counted the ballots in 5 sections on a complaint about the election of the mayor, is yet to issue a decision

The ballots from 5 polling stations in Dobrich were re-counted at a court hearing in the Administrative Court, after Judge Neli Kamenska started the case on the appeal of Krasimir Nikolov, a candidate for mayor of GERB, against a decision of the Municipal Election Commission declaring him elected mayor after the whipping on November 5, Yordan Yordanov /Local Coalition/. The difference between the two candidates was just over 1,000 votes in favor of Yordanov in both the first and second rounds of the election.

In Krasimir Nikolov’s complaint, 19 sections for errors, corrections, findings based on the video surveillance are indicated for re-counting. In the course of presenting the reasons in his appeal, Krasimir Nikolov also requested a count of the ballots in all 129 sections, which the judge rejected. It was requested from the court on the occasion of reports of bought and corporate vote that all reports submitted to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the State Department of Internal Affairs and the Prosecutor’s Office be demanded.

The representatives of the Municipal Electoral Commission /OIC/ contested the complaint as groundless “The bags should not be opened, since the violations referred to in the complaint – strikeouts, are not on the pages that refer to the vote of the voters. In addition, the GERB sections in question had chairmen and secretaries. On the occasion of the numerous deletions in the protocol in section 82, by a deliberate decision of the OIC, we reconvened the entire sectional election commission and re-counted the ballots,” said Kalina Slavova, vice-president of the OIC. Milen Yankov, a lawyer representing the elected mayor Yordan Yordanov, pointed out that the amendments in the protocols refer to data not related to the election results. “There are no scratches in the protocols of 13 sections. I see no reason to appoint expertise.”. Yankov allowed, by court decision, to count the ballots in the 5 sections named as the most “wrong”. Lawyer Michael Ignatov, representative of the Local Coalition, defined the complaint as unfounded. violations should be responded to on the spot,” he added.

Judge Kamenska announced that there will be a recount in the courtroom of the ballots from five sections – 81, 83, 116, 117, 124. In 81 sections, the court accepted 4 of the invalid ballots as valid for Krasimir Nikolov. When counting the ballots from other sections, actual ballots come out of those declared invalid – several each, for both Nikolov and Yordanov.

“The minutes of the meeting will be ready by November 21, after which the parties will have 7 days to submit their comments,” said Judge Kamenska. After that, she will issue a decision.