Democracy in Action (DiA) has continued monitoring the election campaign at country level by engaging 61 long-term observers who report daily on the progress of the election campaign being run by candidates for mayors and for members of municipal assemblies competing for the local election of 22 October 2017.

Election campaign activities monitored at country level

Based on the reporting, in 9 days of the election campaign, the long-term observers have monitored 292 activities of political entities country wide, most of which were public gatherings.

Participation of citizens in rallies

The majority of election activities monitored by DiA were meetings with 50 to 100 participants and there is an increase in meetings held with 100 to 500 participants from the first days of the campaign, while 10 of the monitored meetings were gatherings with over 1000 participants.

Use of public resources

The use of public resources was observed in 15 of the 292 election activities monitored by DiA, including participation of civil servants and official vehicles – in 12 cases for PDK, 3 cases for LDK, 2 cases for Nisma and one case for LVV and Lista Srpska.

Inclusion of children in the campaign

In 87 out of 292 activities (30% of activities) of the election campaign, the presence of children was noted, with a total number of 671 children involved. Children were included in 28 out of 76 activities (37%) of LVV there, in 24 out of 66 activities (36%) of LDK, in 16 out of 65 (25%) of PDK activities, in 9 out of 21 (43%) activities of NISMA, 4 out of 24 activities (17%) of AAK, in 2 activities of Alternativa, 1 activity of AKR, and in 3 out of 21 activities of Lista Srpska. In only 1 activity of AAK, LVV, LDK and PDK organized participation of children was noted, whereas in other cases the participation of children was spontaneous.

Access of persons with disabilities

Persons with disabilities participated in 39 out of the 292 election activities monitored by DiA for the first 9 days of the campaign, where the total number of participants was 166. On the other hand, in 99 election activities out of the 292 monitored activities, no accessibility was provided for persons with disabilities at the location where the activity was organized. In three activities organized by LDK, PDK and NISMA in Peja speakers were persons with disabilities.

Media presence

The media were present in 54% of election activities monitored at country level and they reported freely.

Participation of women

Participation of women in activities conducted within the election campaign has continued to be on average about 10%. On gender basis, 802 men (80%) and 202 women (20%) spoke in activities of political entities.

Participation of women by political entities
In the 9 days of election campaign activities, “Alternativa” leads with 8 women out of 19 speakers (42%), followed by AKR with 25 women out of 72 speakers (30%), LVV with 67 speakers out of 293 (23%) speakers, PDK with 44 women out of 211 speakers (21%), LDK with 31 speakers out of 199 speakers (15%), NISMA with only 10 women out of 69 speakers (14%), and AAK with 9 women out of 69 speakers (13% ). Political entities of Serbian and other non-majority communities have had only 8 speaking women out of 72 (11%) speakers in their activities.

Provision of security

In most of the monitored cases, the Kosovo Police has taken care of securing election activities. In the first 9 days of the campaign, a large part of the activities held by the parties had no security at all.

Hate speech

In 9 out of 292 monitored activities, the use of hate speech was noted, namely in 6 activities organized by PDK, in 1 activity organized by LVV and NISMA each, and one other case from the non-majority community.

Incidents

– At about 10:00 p.m. in Peja, on Eliot Engel street at Stone Bridge, unknown persons damaged LVV offices by throwing stones.

– On September 28, at 8:00 p.m. in Gllareva village, unknown persons set fire to the vehicle of the Assembly candidate from AAK Branch in Klina, Nazif Gashi.

– On September 27, the LDK office in Raushiq village was hit by stones, where a glass was damaged. There is no witness for this case, while the police went out to the scene and collected evidence.

Incident between the two assembly members

Violence is not a means through which political entities can exercise their roles or resolve disputes among themselves. Physical clashes and denigrating language used between two representatives of citizens or deputies, is unacceptable and it is condemned fiercely. Such actions cannot be justified in any form, so political parties have to distance themselves clearly. We call on citizens not to be tempted by such cases and to maintain tranquility. It is of special importance that the election campaign is not affected by such cases. The hate speech could seriously damage such an important process of consolidating the country’s democracy, such as elections. These actions are not in the spirit of how we as a society are trying to build our country. Assembly members involved in this case should be held individually responsible for their actions.