Is it easier to register as presidential contender in neighbouring countrie
In Ukraine it is necessary to collect 300 thousand US dollars instead of signatures, in Poland one should collect the same 100 thousand signatures as in Belarus
Euroradio has interested how many signatures one should collect to be
registered as presidential contender in the neighbouring countries, and
how strictly the validity of these signatures is examined.
In Poland it is easier to register as presidential contender. First,
4 times more people live there, while it is necessary to collect the
same quantity of signatures as in Belarus - 100 thousand. A citizen can
also sign for all the contenders if he or she wants to.
Secondly, if Belarusian Central Election Commission finds more than 15% invalid signatures, the contender is refused in registration. In Poland there is no such a norm. All they require is that a contender should submit 100 thousand valid signatures.
"As soon as the Central Election Commission finds out there are 100 thousand valid signatures, they stop checking all the rest. There is no such a norm, neither 20%, nor 15%. It's like that: you either have 100 thousand valid signatures or you don't", – explained the expert of the State Election Commission Lech Gaizler.
According to him, usually there are 10% of invalid signatures among the submitted ones. For example, wrong address or number of the document, or illegible handwriting. If they find false signatures, forgered ones, then there must be investigation ending in court trial. However, there have never been such cases, stated Lech Gaizler.
In Lithuania there is also no norm with regard to invalid signatures, says Nijolė Žemaitienė, the head of the department on elections organization of the Higher Election Commission of Lithuania.
Nijolė Žemaitienė: "About 20% of signatures are always considered invalid. According to legislation, a contender should provide 20 thousand of valid signatures of the voters".
In Ukraine one doesn't have to collect signatures at all. The contenders should only pay bail amounting to 2,5 million UAH (more than 300 thousand dollars) to a special bank account of the Election Commission.
The money is returned to those contenders who make it to the second round of the elections. Thus, at the last elections, Viktar Janukovich and Julia Tymoshenko received their bails back, while all the other 16 contenders didn't. The money went to the state budget of Ukraine.
In Russia there is a very strict norm with regard to quantity of invalid signatures - there cannot be more than 5% of mistakes. At the previous elections in 2008 the Central Election Commission refused the opposition contender Mikhail Kasyanov in registration due to "incorrectly executed signature sheets". The level of mistakes surpassed 13%. The contender called the decision of CEC a farce.
According to Federal Law on Presidential Elections of the Russian Federation , a contender should collect 2 million signatures in the 140-million country, moreover, no more than 50 thousand signatures should be collected in one and the same subject of the Federation.
Latvia is a parliamentary republic, so the President is elected by the Parliament of the country - Saeima.
