site.btaElection Commissions to Manually Count Machine Voting Receipts as Cross-Check, CEC Spokesperson Says

Section election commissions will manually count machine voting receipts as a cross-check in Bulgaria's October 25 presidential election, Central Election Commission (CEC) spokesperson Stoyanka Balova told Bulgarian National Radio on Sunday.

Balova said each section election commission would manually count the tally sheets to increase transparency in the process of determining the results. The figures from the count will be entered in the commission's protocol, which will be scanned at the regional election commission's data processing centre together with the paper protocol.

This will allow the result recorded in the voting machine's protocol to be compared with the machine voting receipts, she said. The official machine voting result, however, will be the one recorded in the machine protocol.

Balova said the absence of preferential voting in a presidential election should also contribute to faster and more accurate vote counting.

She added that section election commission chairs will receive EUR 185, while other members will receive EUR 160. Each commission member will receive an additional EUR 15 if the protocol is completed correctly.

Balova also discussed the media packages available for the election campaign, saying a public register has been created to track how the funds are spent.

Information on expenditure and new requests for campaign appearances is being submitted daily and processed by CEC staff. The register will be updated on the CEC website every Tuesday and will show where candidates have appeared, the amount spent and the format concerned, including video, interviews and banners.