I personally carry a signature in the mail – Newspaper Kommersant No. 148 (7349) dated 08/16/2022

The Supreme Court of North Ossetia denied the local branch of the Party of Affairs in a lawsuit against the republic’s Central Election Commission demanding that it register a list of its candidates for elections to the regional parliament. Earlier, the commission withdrew the list due to the fact that some of the signatures were allegedly collected in violation, in the post office building in Vladikavkaz, that is, at the place where pensions were issued (Article 5.47 of the Code of Administrative Offenses). The party assures that they collected in a separate office and did not intersect with pensioners.

According to the decision of the CEC of North Ossetia, in order to register the list of candidates for the party, it was necessary to collect 2.6 thousand signatures of voters in support of it. Up to half of the autographs could be electronic. Seven parties were exempted from this obligation – these are the “parliamentary five”, as well as “Motherland” and “Communists of Russia”, which received benefits following the results of previous regional and municipal elections.

At the end of July, the party of the cause submitted 2.8 thousand signatures to the CEC of the republic, including the maximum allowable number of electronic signatures. When checked by the working group, 64 autographs (2.3%) were recognized as invalid, which is an acceptable level of marriage for registration. However, on August 3, the leader of the republican branch and the first number on the list of the Party of Affairs, Artur Khadzaragov, was found guilty of an administrative offense under Art. 5.47 of the Code of Administrative Offenses – for organizing the collection of signatures of voters “in places where pensions, benefits and other social payments are issued.” He was fined 2,000 rubles.

According to the materials of the protocol, on June 18–20, employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for North Ossetia carried out an on-site inspection, as a result of which it was found that in the office of the Party of Cause branch located in the post office building No. 40 of Vladikavkaz (Maxim Gorky Street, 14), “ voters’ signatures were collected in support of the nomination of a list of candidates. In other places, in those days, party members did not collect signatures, in connection with which all 319 autographs collected at that time (13.5% of the total) were declared invalid by the CEC. Since after that the percentage of marriage exceeded the permissible 5%, on August 4, the CEC refused to register the list of the Party of Cause.

Party members themselves do not agree with this decision. “This is a three-story building, a separate isolated room, an air-conditioned office, there are tables. We have created conditions for people to come and sign. And then they tell us that we were collecting signatures at the post office and supposedly someone somehow might have thought that it was necessary to sign for a pension, ”the party’s lawyer Anton Dolgov explained to Kommersant. According to him, the commission did not have the right to raise the level of marriage in signature lists without re-checking the working group and make a decision to refuse registration on the basis of a court decision that has not yet entered into force. Now, however, this argument has already disappeared: the party failed to challenge the decision in an appeal. Nevertheless, she is going to continue the fight up to the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation, summed up Mr. Dolgov.

Recall that in addition to North Ossetia, elections of regional deputies will be held on September 11 in Udmurtia, Krasnodar Territory, Penza, Saratov and Sakhalin regions. North Ossetia is the only subject where there will be no list of candidates from the parliamentary “newcomers” – the New People party: because of claims to the documents, the republican CEC excluded 17 out of 85 people from it, after which the number of nominees became less than the minimum required by law (70 candidates). The Supreme Court of North Ossetia sided with the electoral commission. The press service of the party assured Kommersant that they continue to fight for candidates and will reach the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation.

It is interesting that, despite the parliamentary benefits, the lists in the two republics could not be certified by the “Communists of Russia” either: the Central Election Commission of North Ossetia had complaints about the procedure for nominating candidates, and in Udmurtia the parties were refused because of 20% of defects in signature lists. As the head of the Udmurt branch of the Communists of Russia, Yuri Mishkin, told Kommersant, they did not dispute the decision of the Central Executive Committee, since there was “no point in it.”

In total, six parties in five regions tried to collect signatures in the elections to regional parliaments, but only in three cases did this process succeed: the Communists of Russia and Motherland in the Saratov Region (9.5 thousand signatures each) and the Pensioners’ Party on Sakhalin (1.9 thousand). Yabloko in the Saratov region failed to enlist the support of the required number of voters, and in Sakhalin its list was not certified, even despite the parliamentary privilege, due to complaints about the nomination procedure: Yabloko did not invite a representative of the Ministry of Justice to the conference. “Although he has nothing to do with electoral actions at all. If it wasn’t “Yabloko”, of course, no one would pay (to this violation.— “b”) attention,” said party chairman Nikolai Rybakov to Kommersant. Yabloko will not challenge this decision, he added.

Electoral lawyer Anton Rudakov calls the practice of denial of registration in connection with the collection of signatures in places prohibited for this quite rare. At the same time, the Party of Cause has a chance to restore the list, since we are talking about a separate room, the expert is sure. “They really had a lease agreement, the post office was nearby, and she had her own agreement. Coincidentally, this is one building,” he said.

Andrey Ashes; Mikhail Krasilnikov, Izhevsk