The Coalition for Free and Fair Elections “Pod Lupom” is conducting a civic, non-partisan observation mission for the early presidential elections in Republika Srpska (RS), scheduled for 23 November. The observation mission is being conducted by 26 long-term observers (LTOs) from 21 civil society organizations, members of the Coalition “Pod Lupom”.
On election day, the election process will be monitored by up to 400 election day observers (EDOs), who will be deployed throughout RS.
“Independent, non-partisan election observation plays a key role in maintaining citizens’ trust in the election process. With their presence, observers ensure greater transparency, prevent election irregularities and contribute to the free expression of voters’ will,” said the Coalition “Pod Lupom”.
The long-term observers will work until election day to observe the work of local election commissions, record and report election irregularities and fraud, and recruit and train election day observers.
The Coalition “Under the Spotlight” has already sent ten reports of election irregularities to the Central Election Commission of Bosnia and Herzegovina (CIK BiH) relating to premature election campaigns, paid political advertising during the ban, and the abuse of children for political purposes. Some reports have already been rejected because, according to the CEC, they do not contain elements of an election campaign.
“This does not change the fact that candidates are freely campaigning in the field, attending public events, visiting citizens, and publicly promoting all of this. However, all of this is not a campaign for the CEC BiH. In this way, the new provisions of the Election Law of BiH are rendered meaningless and the uneven approach of the election administration towards processing reports of election irregularities continues, which opens up room for their repetition in the future,” the Coalition “Under the Spotlight” stated in a statement.
This non-governmental organization announced that on election day it will observe the election process at approximately every fifth polling station in the RS. Election day observers will monitor all phases of the election process on that day, including the organization and opening of polling stations, the voting process, the closing of polling stations, the counting of votes, and the packaging of election materials.
They will monitor all possible irregularities that could affect the election process and will react immediately to eliminate the observed irregularities and ensure that the elections are conducted in accordance with the law. Observers will be deployed to a representative sample of selected polling stations in all parts of the RS, which allows for statistically reliable monitoring and reporting on the course of election day.
The Coalition called on political entities and candidates who have been certified to participate in the elections to respect the election rules, and called on all competent institutions, election administration, police agencies and prosecutors’ offices to cooperate and respond promptly in the coming period. They also called on citizens to report any election irregularities they observe to the Coalition.
