CRTA has formed the largest election observation mission so far, that will assess the quality of voting process at presidential, parliamentary and Belgrade elections on April 3. More than three thousand of observers, trained in accordance with the highest international standards, will monitor elections, which is twice more observers than in 2020 elections.
On behalf of CRTA, I would like to thank you for the opportunity to address the Delegation. 2022 Elections will take place in the shadow of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Serbian authorities’ hesitation to fully align with the EU foreign policy is an outcome of a long-trend Russian political and economic influence and Serbian energy dependency from Russia. The context of war and lack of straightforward policies may intensify tensions in the ongoing election campaign. Pro-regime media are exploiting the war to glorify Russia and create new narratives that the president is heroically resisting pressures in securing Serbian independence. The election campaign in Serbia started with diversity in the election offer but in less favorable conditions for parties that do not constitute the ruling majority.
There has been a lot of talks on social networks and media recently about whether party activists can knock on citizens’ doors asking them for whom they will vote. The question that has logically arisen is whether a door-to-door campaign is allowed or not.
Erasing the line between state and party interests, and a strong commitment of government representatives to use state institutions as a means to secure support to the ruling party and to build a personality cult around Aleksandar Vučić, with contributions by mainstream media, marked the “campaign before the campaign”, as shown by the CRTA Election…
On February 4th, Members of Parliament adopted a set of new laws regulating the conduct of the election process. These laws came into force on February 7th, meaning that the changes were adopted just before the calling of the election campaign, and less than two months before the election day announced for April 3, 2022….
On the basis of 98 percent of processed sample, a total of 57,4 percent of citizens who voted “for” the confirmation of the act on changing the Constitution of the Republic of Serbia, while a total of 41,6 percent of voters voted “against” constitutional changes, the CRTA’s observation mission reported. Margin of error with confidence interval of 95% was +/- 2,4 percent. Invalid ballots numbered a total of 1 percent of ballots.
A total of 27,6 percent of voters registered in the voters registry voted in referendum on constitutional changes in the part related to the judiciary by 7 pm, the CRTA’s observation mission stated. Margin of error with confidence interval of 95% was +/- 1,3 percent.
CRTA’s observation mission assesses the poor quality in the conduct of the voting process in the first part of the day, reflecting in inadequate preparation of polling stations (8%) and breaches of voting procedures outside of polling stations (6%). On significant number of polling stations – almost 30%, all members of polling boards were not present at the polls opening, representing the inadequate preparedness of bodies authorized to conduct the voting process.
A total of 12 percent of voters registered in the voters registry voted in referendum on constitutional changes in the part related to the judiciary by 1 pm, the CRTA’s observation mission stated. Margin of error with confidence interval of 95% was +/- 0,5 percent.
