Evaluation of Majoritarian By-Elections of Self-Government in Zugdidi

The monitoring involved 3 precinct and 1 district electoral commission observers and 1 mobile group. The main novelty introduced in the elections was the piloting of machines for electronic counting of votes (e-counting). The Central Election Commission (CEC) adopted a new decree amending voting procedures provided in the Election Code of Georgia. The decree abolished the control sheet and registrar's signature on a ballot, changed the position of a stamp on a ballot, and introduced voting through a nontransparent box which is part of the e-counting machine. ISFED believes that the existing legislation does not allow such changes, which calls into question the legitimacy of changing the voting procedures by the CEC decree and bypassing the Election Code. On Election Day, the process of opening of polling stations, voting, and counting of votes was mostly peaceful and free from any major violations. However, some voters found it hard to adapt to the new procedures and certain shortcomings were found. ISFED filed one complaint with the DEC regarding polling station no.74 of Tsaishi over misuse of voters' personal information from the voters' list by a registrar and entered a verbal warning into the precinct logbook concerning a mistake made by the same registrar. The pilot project was carried out in three polling stations only, in presence of CEC and DEC representatives, who provided assistance to PEC members as needed. ISFED closely followed the process of voting through electronic technologies and CEC-established procedures. ISFED observers reported that commission members, voters, and observers present at polling stations were generally interested in the new technologies. However, a number of problems and shortcomings were found in the process of using the new technologies and procedures on Election Day. The problems and shortcomings included elderly voters and voters with visual impairments often having trouble seeing the oval along the candidate's name which they had to color in using a special marker. Voters often incorrectly placed the ballot in the special envelope, and voters found it hard to place their envelopes correctly into the e-counting machine. In some cases, voters did not fill in the circle along the name of a candidate of their choice and used different methods to mark their choice. At the polling station #103, the machine for casting and counting of votes stopped working for several minutes, temporarily suspending the voting process. ISFED believes that any attempt of the electoral administration to use electronic technologies in the future should be well thought-out, in order not to jeopardize validity and integrity of election process in the eyes of voters, electoral subjects or observers. In case of using technologies, voting procedures should be in conformity with the Election Code, which may require certain amendments in the legislation. Therefore, any attempt of the electoral administration to introduce new technologies in the voting process should be accompanied by analysis of possible risks and benefits of the new technologies and review of applicable regulations, based solely on a broad dialogue that engages all electoral stakeholders.