Description
The project addresses the demand to amend the Electoral Code and the electoral system put forward during the public rallies of social discontent over the last few months. The project aims to assess the impact of the existing electoral rules and advocate amendments to empower citizens’ participation in the political process and raise trust in elections. First, detailed information will be collected about the organization of the early parliamentary elections in May 2013. Second, the collected information will be analyzed and an impact assessment of the electoral Code provisions will be carried out. Finally, the findings and recommendations for amendments will be published in a report and presented publicly at a round table with the stakeholders and a press conference. The main target group is decision-makers and the media.
Summary of project results
The project addressed the demand to amend the Electoral Code and the electoral system put forward during the public rallies of social discontent during 2013. As a result of the project’s activities the project promoter developed a set of proposals for amendments in the Electoral Code, containing topics such as the election observation, media coverage, the access to the electoral process and the transparency in the work of the election administration. 11 out of the 15 proposals were implemented and adopted in the new Electoral Code. A lot of the IPED`s documents, recommendations and statements regarding the draft of the Electoral Code were accepted and implemented in the new Code. As a result of the IPED`s efforts the conditions for independent observation of the election process were improved, there is greater transparency in the work of the Central Election Commission, the participants in the election campaign have free air time in the public media and the paid advertisements should be marked, the conditions for independent candidates are less restrictive, the Central Election Commission has developed a unit for the training of the election administration. As a part of the project the IPED organized a broad debate regarding the adopted Electoral Code. All interested parties and target groups took part in the discussion - institutions responsible for the elections’ organization, NGOs, media, citizens. Thus the pros and cons of the new Electoral Code were discussed and the serious media coverage of the event once more presented the newly adopted changes to the public. All project’s documents and activities were public and open for debate with the interested parties. The involvement of the target groups in all activities and sharing the results with them made the project more sustainable. This also made more sustainable the public’s interest in implementing and insisting on higher standards for free and fair election process and higher level of citizen’s empowerment when electing the representative public institutions. The amended Electoral Code in a certain extent is ensuring more fair and equal opportunities for the participants in the elections, which will have a long term effect as in Bulgaria there will be different elections each year until 2017.
Summary of bilateral results