Kostroma deputies want to deprive the right of civic organizations to observe elections

Author: Nikolai Sorokin, a political scientist, Ph.D in History

Nikolai Sorokin, a board member of Kostroma Center of Regional Studies, chairman of ‘Memorial’ branch in Kostroma and coordinator of the OIG in Kostroma region shared on Facebook his concerns about likely abolition of civic election observation in the region. Please, find his full post below.

On December 16, 2015, at a meeting of the Kostroma Regional Duma the chairman of Election Commission of Kostroma region, Mikhail Barabanov proposed to significantly shorten the list of organizations entitled to nominate election observers.

I would like to remind that the current Electoral Code of Kostroma region was adopted on 30 December 1998 under the initiative of non-partisan Governor Victor Shershunov, who died in a car crash in 2007.

According to this Code, by now ‘a registered candidate, electoral association which nominated registered candidates, registered list of candidates, each political party or all-Russian public association registered under the rules established by federal law, as well as: within the territory of Kostroma region - interregional, regional civic associations; within the territory of municipality - local  civic associations registered under the rules established by federal law’ are entitled to nominate election observers in Kostroma region (Art. 31, Part 1 of the Electoral Code of Kostroma region).

Based on the proposal of regional election commission the deputies decided to modify the above quoted provision established in Art. 31 of Part 1 of the Election Code of Kostroma Region in the following way: ‘In the Elections to Kostroma Regional Duma, as well as local municipal elections in Kostroma region, only a registered candidate, an electoral association which has nominated a registered candidate, registered candidates, electoral associations, which have registered a list of candidates are entitled to nominate election observers’ (see The list of draft laws of Regional Duma, item 22 – ‘On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of the Kostroma region’).

Thus, the amendments to Electoral Code of Kostroma region initiated by regional election commission deprived of the right to nominate election observers not only all civic organizations, but also those political parties which in these elections for whatever reason could not register its list of candidates.

In addition, with the proposal of regional election commission the deputies intend to reintroduce early voting in municipalities, which was canceled on the eve of 2015 Elections.

The chairman of regional election commission, Mikhail Barabanov said: ‘The cancellation was a mistake, my personal one. We have received plenty of citizens’ complaints, why they cannot exercise their right to vote. We cannot ignore these requests’.

The Regional Duma passed the amendments to the regional law proposed by the regional commission with the majority of votes in the first reading (‘Rossiyskaya Gazeta’, the publication of 16 December 2015).