Most people with disabilities know little about the mixed voting system, how and who is exactly elected under it. This was found during the implementation of a project called “Informed and Conscious Vote”, carried out by Keystone Moldova in partnership with Promo-LEX, with the support of USAID.
Natalia Cojocaru, Keystone project coordinator, said experts were invited to meet with people with disabilities and their care providers and inform them about their electoral rights, about the novel mixed voting system in particular, and about accessibility issues. Electoral manifestos were also discussed: how disability issues are addressed and how political actors can be influenced to pay increased attention to disability issues. Another subject concerned electoral violations and how they can be reported.
More than 2,000 people from 50 communities in 10 districts of the country, as well as the beneficiaries of six temporary placement centers for the disabled were informed under the project. According to Natalia Cojocaru, this contributed to a better turnout among this group of voterds compared with the 2016 presidential election.
53% of the beneficiaries said they never participated in voter education sessions before. A combined 97% responded they were very or fairly satisfied with the sessions and 96% thought they were useful and welcome for their communities.
According to Ecaterina Golovatîi, a deinstitutionalization specialist, people with disabilities did not know that polling stations must be made accessible to them. A mock vote was held during the workshops for a better understanding of the process. “There were cases when people did not know what to do. We hope that the difficulties observed will be taken into account by those who will more thoroughly inform people with disabilities and their care providers,” said Ecaterina Golovatîi.