Disorders with home voting in St. Petersburg

On the day of the municipal and governor elections in St. Petersburg, observers massively report that members of the commissions are taking hundreds of ballots from the sites for the subdominal voting. This is associated with preparing falsifications.

The coordinator of the organization “Observers of St. Petersburg” Krasmyr Vranks told “Paper” , as is usually the subordinate voting and how the export of ballots can affect the election results.

Krasmiri are Vranks

Coordinator of "Observers of St. Petersburg"

-In theory, by home voting should use people who physically cannot come to the polls-due to illness, ailments and the like. They write a statement in advance and submit it through social services or relatives in the PEC (precinct election commissions - approx. “Papers” ). In the areas, they should make a route to [come to people home] and let them vote. Voters by law must vote alone at home.

Usually, no more than 30 people use the home voting, on some PEC these are two or three people. To date, we see that in some PEC - for example, in the Frunze, Moscow and Admiralteysky districts - several hundred ballots are spent on the home voting.

Bulletins for home -made voting, we believe, will become a tool for falsification of these elections. Because they will be able to add 50-100 votes to certain municipal candidates. And in practice, in municipal elections, sometimes we are talking about a difference of 10-20 votes. Such stuffing may not leave a chance of independent candidates.

Home voting is also used in the governor's election. We recorded how in the Kirovsky district a member of the commission himself fills these ballots and lowers into their urn. In the Kalinin district, members of the commission themselves filled these ballots, sitting at McDonald's. According to our estimates, in general, this can increase the candidate's result by about 15 %.

Why did the number of ballots [for home -made voting] have grown sharply, was not officially explained. Applications for a subdominal vote should have arrived until 14:00 yesterday, so that there was time to make lists, but it would be physically unrealistic to accept 200-300 notifications.

There are more in the plots of the ballots, [than included in the register of people]: usually about two or three ballots are given in case something goes wrong-and observers report that [September 8] at the PEC in the “reserve” of 50-100 ballots. In addition, as we know from observers, on some PEC, the election committee of municipalities gave the precinct commission to 100-300 bulletins more than necessary. Where observers noticed this, the ballots counted; But this did not happen in all areas.

The fact that in these elections there would be falsifications with home voting, we knew in advance. This week, we were made a recording of falsification training, where they prepared members of the commissions. It was just talked about the homeless vote. They also talked about violations during the counting, which we will track after 20:00.

Home voting should be considered separately, so falsification for the necessary people will be revealed.

"Paper" is a direct broadcast from the governor and municipal elections in St. Petersburg.

Photo on the cover: Sofya Volyanova