Today the VotCorect coalition met with Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu to discuss the conclusions of the June 9 election monitoring report, as well as the priorities for electoral reform and the organization of parliamentary and presidential elections. Septimius Pârvu (electoral program coordinator, Expert Forum), Maria Krause (independent expert, Electoral Observatory) and Otilia Nuțu (public policy expert, Expert Forum board member) participated on behalf of the coalition.
Some of the messages delivered:
- We appreciate the Government’s openness to discuss these issues.
- These elections were visibly affected by the decision of the merger – which we opposed – which affected the understanding of the process by voters, by the electoral administration, but also limited the access of some competitors to the electoral process.
- For us, this was the most difficult election to observe, both in terms of the procedures, the fragmented legislation, and the numerous electoral activities.
- We believe that one of the negative, high-impact effects has been the decrease in public confidence in the fairness of the elections. This was particularly reflected in the counting of votes and the tabulation of results.
- We believe that many questions remain about the increased number of complaints, the numerous requests for recount rejected , but also contested results (especially in Bucharest), about which there are legitimate doubts. There are inconsistencies between the data in the minutes for which we have no answer from the competent institutions.
- Many of the issues related to challenging the integrity of the elections and the representativeness of mayors would also be solved by reintroducing the two-round voting system for local elections.
- Another negative aspect is to allow the migration of local elected officials, especially in the context of the case law of the Constitutional Court which declared the migration of councillors after the 2014 migration unconstitutional.
- We recommend that a thorough analysis of the efficiency and integrity of the organization of the elections should be carried out after these elections, which will help to adopt improvements for the next elections.
The Coalition also made specific recommendations related to the improvement of the legislative framework, campaigning and campaign financing, the powers of public institutions, increasing confidence in the electoral process, candidacies and transparency of the registration process, and women’s participation in electoral processes. We also discussed the conduct of Election Day and election observation.
After the meeting it was agreed that the dialogue will continue in the context of the organization of presidential and parliamentary elections.
The full list of recommendations can be found here.
The election monitoring report is available here.