The Central Election Commission will gather with other people’s thoughts

The Central Election Commission (CEC), regional commissions and public observers are preparing their proposals based on the results of the presidential campaign. The emergence of registered polling stations named after the heroes of the Northern Military District, the use of an electronic voter list throughout the country and the introduction of liability for calls for spoiling ballots are only part of the initiatives that are now being discussed at different levels.

The Central Election Commission plans to approve the financial report on the results of the presidential elections on May 28, its deputy chairman Nikolai Bulaev said at a meeting of the commission on March 27. Only after this the presidential campaign will officially end. However, he noted, at the same time the CEC has already begun preparations for a single voting day in 2024. It will not be easy, Mr. Bulaev warned, so “there is no time to relax.”

According to the Central Election Commission, this year there will be more than 3.5 thousand campaigns in 82 regions, including one by-election to the State Duma (a vacancy was created after the deputy from Khakassia Sergei Sokol headed the Supreme Council of the republic), 16 elections of regional heads and 13 — legislative assemblies of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation (in the Altai Republic and the Volgograd Region, elections of governors and deputies will be combined). In addition, there will be direct elections of three heads of regional capitals and 21 campaigns to elect city parliaments in the administrative centers of the constituent entities.

The regions were asked to share their thoughts on amending the electoral legislation; they will be expected within a week. The CEC, according to Nikolai Bulaev, has already prepared its proposals for changes. In addition, at a meeting on Wednesday, the Central Election Commission decided to provide additional remuneration to members of the commission and chairmen of election commissions of the constituent entities (in the amount of two and a half official salaries) for active work in preparing and conducting presidential elections.

The Independent Public Monitoring Association also presented its recommendations for improving elections based on the results of monitoring the presidential campaign on March 27. In particular, as Alexander Brod, a member of the Human Rights Council (HRC), said at a meeting in the Public Chamber, they speak of the need to improve the status and create registered polling stations. It would be useful if they were named after famous fellow countrymen who participated in the Northern Military District, Mr. Brod explained. According to him, it also seems appropriate to introduce liability at the legislative level for individuals and legal entities for public calls for deliberate damage to ballots. Public observers also suggest exploring the possibility of the presence of members of public headquarters and experts recommended by public chambers when checking documents submitted by candidates at the stages of nomination and registration.

The executive secretary of the HRC and the head of the monitoring working group for monitoring the observance of the electoral rights of citizens, Alexander Tochenov, noted that problems with the voter lists remain: they contain dead people, and the living often do not find themselves there, which introduces nervousness and interferes with the exercise of voting rights. It is clear that the question here is not so much for the election commissions as for the Ministry of Internal Affairs and municipal authorities, Mr. Tochenov made a reservation, but perhaps a unified electronic voter list could help. Also, according to him, an algorithm is needed to solve the problem of remote electronic voting (DEG) that failed for technical reasons (for example, due to a communication failure), so that in this situation the voter can vote – of course, providing mechanisms that will eliminate the possibility of double voting .

The chairman of the territorial election commission (TEC) of the DEG, Oleg Artamonov, objected that quickly deploying an electronic list of voters nationwide is very expensive, and it is impossible to record in the DEG system that a voter has voted, since this violates the secrecy of voting. Therefore, he believes, experts should consider how to ensure in the future the possibility of expressing the will of voters in cases of possible technical failures. Mr. Artamonov also considers it useful to codify procedures related to electronic voting: in particular, it requires a procedure for checking computers before sharing the key, as well as a solution for the digital signature with which TEC DEG certifies transaction upload files in the authorized zone of the surveillance portal.

In general, the draft recommendations note, the elections demonstrated a high level of organization of the electoral system, the effectiveness and consistency of election legislation, transparency and openness of election procedures, as well as the scale and efficiency of public control and observation structures.

Anastasia Kornya