The Coalition of local CSOs for election monitoring, Democracy in Action, today through the media conference unveiled to the public the election observation and media monitoring report for the parliamentary elections of June 11, 2017.

DiA evaluated that the June 11, 2017 elections were peaceful as long as no serious violations and violent acts were noted that would diminish the public’s confidence in the election process.

DiA observed the 10-day election campaign with 61 long-term observers who have assessed for the language used in the rallies, the representation of women in the campaign, as participants in rallies or candidates of political parties, the involvement of children in the campaign in an organized manner, the use of public resources, the presence of civil servants, the participation of persons with disabilities and the access that they were provided in political party rallies. For the Election Day, DiA engaged 2,500 short-term observers who have covered all polling stations in Kosovo.

The positive aspects in election organizing are considered:

– Good coordination between state institutions on Election Day, such as CEC, Kosovo Police and State Prosecution, which have influenced in the regularity of the process;

– Efficiency of the Election Complaint and Appeal Commission in reviewing complaints and imposing fines;

– The electoral campaign was generally conducted without hate speech and incidents;

– Acceptance of election results by political parties and their candidates, which is an indicator of a high level of trust in the process.

Whereas the challenges that followed the process were:

– Increased number of invalid ballots;

– Late commencement of the voter information and education campaign;

– Poor training of the Polling Station Council members;

– Technical problems in registering voters from abroad;

– Inaccurate voters lists, where the presence of deceased persons is still evident;

– Intimidation and pressure on voters from representatives of the same community, reported in Serb-majority municipalities;

– Use of public resources for election campaign purposes;

– Presence of children in campaign and the low number of women in election activities of EMB;

– Violation of the vote secrecy (by photographing the ballot, voting outside the voting booth, group voting or known as family voting);

– Assistance to voters by not respecting procedures such as registration in the voting book;

– Frequent violations of the Code of Conduct by political parties, namely the placement of electoral campaign materials in public spaces;

– Hesitation of political parties to declare campaign planning and expenditures;

– Delays in certification of final election results;

– Large number of ballot boxes that were sent to quarantine for verification;

– Accreditation of political party observers through fictitious NGOs.

The media monitoring report has highlighted the time, space and coverage that electronic and written media have provided to political subjects during the election campaign.