Doc. 9134

25 June 2001

Ad hoc Committee for the observation of the parliamentary elections in Bulgaria

Report

Bureau of the Assembly

Rapporteur: Mr Henning Gjellerod, Denmark, SOC

Introduction

1.       At the invitation of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Bulgaria, dated 30 May 2001, the Bureau of the Parliamentary Assembly set up an ad-hoc committee to observe the elections to the National Assembly of Bulgaria which took place on 17 June 2001. The Parliamentary Assembly's observers performed their task in close co-operation with the Election Observation Mission of the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE/ODIHR).

2.       Based on the proposals of the Assembly’s Political Groups, the ad-hoc committee was composed as follows:

Socialist Group (SOC)

Mr Henning GJELLEROD       Denmark

Group of the European People’s Party (EPP/CD)

Mr Lars RISE       Norway

Mr Björn von der ESCH       Sweden

Group of the United Left (UEL)

Mr Doros CHRISTODOULIDES       Cyprus

Secretariat:

Mr Vladimir DRONOV, Special Advisor to the Secretary General of the Assembly

Mr Bas KLEIN, Secretary of the Committee

3.       The ad-hoc committee held a meeting on Saturday 16 June. I was elected Chairman as well as Rapporteur of the Committee.

4.       In addition to observing the elections the delegation held talks with a number of political leaders and election officials. A programme of the meetings is provided in Appendix I.

5.       The delegation members were split up into three teams, who visited in total around 35 polling stations. The teams traveled to Sofia, Pernik and Varna.

6.       The ad-hoc committee wishes to thank the OSCE/ODIHR, and especially its Sofia based Election Observation Mission, for the excellent co-operation and logistical support throughout the visit. However, the final press conference was too long on technical detail and too short on political content. It will be important in future exercises with OSCE/ODIHR to ensure that a proper balance between the technical and political inputs, and both organisations, is maintained.

The Pre-Election Period

7.       These parliamentary elections were the fifth held since the establishment of a multiparty system in 1991, and the first held after an outgoing parliament completed its full four-year term. The Parliamentary elections were called for 17 June 2001, in accordance with the constitutional provisions that stipulate that elections for a new National Assembly must be held within two months from the expiration of the mandate of the preceding National Assembly.

8.       The National Assembly of the Republic of Bulgaria is a unicameral body consisting of 240 members, which are elected for a four year term according to a proportional election system with a four percent threshold which is established on the national level. The 2001 parliamentary elections were governed by two recently amended laws: “The Law for the Election of Members of the National Assembly” and the “Law on Political Parties”. Despite the late adoption of these laws in April 2001, and some concerns about the absence of legal guidelines for the decision making procedures in the Central Election Committee (CEC), the new legal framework was considered a clear improvement over the preceding situation.

9.       The three-tiered election administration consist of a Central Election Commission (CEC), 31 Regional Election Commissions (REC - one for each constituency) and Sectional Election Committees (SEC) on the level of the Polling station. The members to these bodies are appointed after consultation with the parties that are represented in parliament. To prevent domination of the election commission by a single party the law establishes that the chairperson and secretary of the commissions must come from different parties and that no party or coalition may have a majority on a commission. A transitional provision in the new election law established that the 2001 parliamentary elections were to be administered by the same CEC that oversaw the last elections in 1997.

b       Registration of Parties and Voters

10.       In total 6.845.875 voters were registered on the voter list, including Bulgarians living abroad. In order to facilitate voting for Bulgarians living abroad the CEC requested the governments of countries with large Bulgarian communities to be able to set up SECs outside the Bulgarian diplomatic missions. The CEC informed the Committee that around 155 SECs had been set up outside Bulgaria, 45 of which in different cities in Turkey.

11.       The CEC registered a total of 65 parties for the 2001 parliamentary elections. Nine parties were denied registration. Of the registered parties, 15 withdrew before election day, while 14 did not submit candidate lists in a single constituency, effectively reducing the number of contesting parties to 31. In addition 11 independent candidates were registered for this election.

12.       The political map in Bulgaria changed in April with the entering in the election campaign of the National Movement Simeon II, headed by Mr. Simeon Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, former Zsar of Bulgaria. On 23 April the Sofia City Court denied registration of the National Movement Simeon II as a political party on the grounds that it did not fulfill several criteria laid down in the Law on Political Parties, among which failure to show when and where its foundation congress took place and how its leadership was elected. However, on 2 May 2001 the CEC registered the National Movement after it went into coalition with two smaller parties, the Party of Bulgarian Women and the Movement for National Revival “Oborishte”, who agreed to register under the name “Coalition National Movement Simeon II”. This raised concerns about the Coalition’s internal decision making processes.

13.       The CEC also registered two other parties using the words “Simeon II” in their name. This lead to allegations by the Coalition National Movement Simeon II of intentional voter confusion by vested political interests.

      c.        The election campaign

14.       The election campaign officially started on 17 May and ended on 15 June 2001, and was mostly calm and low key in its approach, while intensifying in the last week before the elections.

15.       The election campaign was characterised by negative campaigning, and allegations of possible vote rigging and election fraud on election day. These allegations centred on the new election law and the composition and decision making processes of the CEC. Our committee however found no factual evidence substantiating those allegations.

16.       Bulgaria has a pluralistic media environment, including private and public broadcasting and a wide range of printed media, giving the public broad access to a wide range of opinions. While there is no extensive regulatory framework for the printed media, the election law sets detailed rules for the coverage of the election campaign in the broadcasting media. In general the campaign coverage of the parliamentary elections was in compliance with the law, albeit taken in letter rather than spirit. The regulatory framework for public media was felt to be overly restrictive and not encouraging open debate among the contestants. The fact that all campaign appearances, including debates, had to be paid for by the parties limited de-facto the public’s access to information. The practise of dividing the parties into two separate groups for the debates, one with the parliamentary parties, one with the non-parliamentarian ones, effectively deprived one of the main contestants in the elections, the Coalition National Movement Simeon II, from access to the public media. The extensive coverage of government officials by the public media during the election campaign was regretted.

Election Day

17.       The elections were carried out in a calm and orderly manner and in compliance with the election law. The international observers did not report any significant problems or disturbances. The members of the election committees carried out their tasks in a professional and competent manner and seemed to be well informed of the provisions in the new election law.

18.       Our observation teams were well received in all polling stations and their positive impact of their presence on the conduct of the elections was mentioned in several cases. In addition to the international observers – a total of 130 teams were fielded by OSCE/ODIHR - also two domestic NGOs, the Bulgarian Association for Fair Elections and Civil Rights (BAFERC) and the Civil Initiative for Free and Democratic Elections (CIFDE), as well as representatives of political parties and candidates were accredited to observe the elections. The domestic observers, found by international observers as being present in approximately a quarter of all polling stations, did not report any significant problems or disturbances during the voting.

19.       Despite the complex voting system in Bulgaria, where voters select from different colour coded ballots to cast their vote, relatively few invalid votes were cast, which underlines the level of voter education in Bulgaria. The committee members noted that the parties using similar names to the Coalition National Movement Simeon II, also used similar colour schemes on their ballots, potentially confusing voters. Only very few instances of family, group or proxy voting where recorded by the international observers.

20.       Initial concerns that the system of voters licenses, which allow a voter to cast his or her vote in a polling station other than the one in which he or she is registered, would allow multiple voting by the same person, did not materialise.

21       The delegation regretted that the election law makes no provision for mobile voting stations which would have allowed all disabled and home-bound voters to cast their ballot, who were now effectively disenfranchised.

Results of the ballot

22.       The high voter turnout of 67%, some 8% higher than in 1997, is a clear indication of the voters’ interest in these elections and their confidence in the democratic process.

23.       The official results of the 2001 parliamentary elections were published by the CEC on Wednesday 20 June 2001. The undisputed winner of these elections is the Coalition National Movement Simeon II, with 42.74% of the vote and 120 seats in the new parliament, one seat short of an absolute majority.

24.       Other parties elected into the new parliament are: the Union of Democratic Forces (18.18 % of the votes and 51 seats), the Coalition for Bulgaria, headed by the Bulgarian Socialist Party (17.15% of the votes and 48 seats) and the Movement for Right and Freedoms (7.45% of the vote and 21 seats).

25.       Two other parties gained significant results in the vote, but were not able to secure the 4% threshold established by law: the coalition Gergyovden-VMRO with 3.63 % of the vote and the Coalition “Simeon II” with 3.44 % of the vote. The other parties contesting in these elections failed to gain any significant number of votes.

26.       The unexpectedly high results for the two other parties with similar names to that of the winning party, the Coalition “Simeon II” (3.44% of the vote) and National Union for Tsar Simeon II ( 1.70 % of the vote), seem to give weight to the claim of the Coalition National Movement Simeon II that the similarity of the names had lead to voter confusion .

Conclusions

27.       The results of these elections have drastically changed the political landscape in Bulgaria. These results and the high voter turnout are a clear indication of the desire for change favoured by the Bulgarian electorate. It will now be up to the newly elected leaders to see to it that the aspirations of the electorate are fully respected. In this respect it will be important for the winning coalition to answer existing concerns about the coherence of its programme, its decision making process as well as the future role of its leader Mr. Simeon Saxe-Coburg-Gotha.

28.       In several instances the positive impact of the presence of international observers on the conduct of these elections was mentioned by election officials.

29.       The concerns of the Assembly, mentioned in Resolution 1211 (2000) on the Honouring of Obligations and Commitments by Bulgaria, specifically the independence of the judiciary and media, the generalisation of corruption, the deterioration of living standards for a large part of the population and the increasing divide within society, were the main planks of the platform of the winning coalition. It can therefore be concluded that the concerns of the Assembly are shared by a large part of the Bulgarian electorate.

APPENDIX 1

PROGRAMME

15 – 18 June 2001

Saturday 16 June 2001

Hotel Hilton Sofia

08.00       Meeting of the Ad-Hoc Committee

09.00       Meeting with EOM and briefing:

Mr. Hrair Balian, Head of OSCE/ODIHR election section

10.15 Meeting with CEC (Central Election Commission):

      Mr. Valentin Georgiev, Secretary

Mr. Mihail Konstantinov, Member

10.45       Coffee-break

11.15       Meeting with the President of the Parliament:

      Mr. Yordan Sokolov, Speaker of the Parliament

13.00       Meeting with representative from ODS

      (United Democratic Forces)

13.45       Meeting with representatives from BSP,

      (Bulgarian Socialist Party)

      Mr. Rumen Ovcharov, Chairman

Mladen Chervenyakov and Krassimir Stoyanov, Members of the Executive Board

14.20       Meeting with representatives from DPS,

      (Movement for Rights and Freedoms)

14.50       Coffee-break

16.00        Meeting with representatives from CIFDE       (NGO)

      Mr. Ilia Bozhinov, Chairman

      Mr. Daniel Stoyanov, Legal Expert

17.00       Deployment

Sunday 17 June 2001

Election observation

Monday 18 June 2001

Hotel Hilton Sofia

10.30       Ad-Hoc Committee meeting

12.00       Joint Debriefing with OSCE/ODIHR EOM

13.30       Meeting with representatives from National Movement Simeon II

14.30       Joint Press Conference OSCE / Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe

APPENDIX 2