The electoral constituencies are divided into polling places where the people vote and the votes are then counted. The polling places are created by district electoral councils at least 35 days before the election day and cover each at least 30 and at most 3,000 voters. For elections of any type and for national referendums, the polling places are constituted during the same period of time.
The polling places are usually established in publicly owned buildings and are set up so as to facilitate access to them for persons with disabilities and elderly people. Special polling places can be created at hospitals, maternity hospitals, sanatoriums and old people’s homes. Abroad, the polling places are housed by Moldova’s embassies and consular offices.
The electoral offices of polling places are set up by district electoral councils at least 25 days before the election day and consist of at least five and at most 11 members, with the number of members being odd. Three members of the electoral office of the polling place are proposed by local councils. The other members are suggested by parties and other sociopolitical organizations represented in Parliament, by one by each party or another sociopolitical organization. If it is not enough, the remaining vacancies of member are filled by the district electoral council at the suggestion of the Central Election Commission, from the Register of Electoral Functionaries.
The electoral office of the polling place keeps the electoral registers, ensures their integrity and the integrity of ballots. The members of the electoral office compile the additional voter rolls, adding to them persons who vote based on the right to vote certificates and those who, for particular reasons, weren’t included in the main registers of voters. These inform the people who live on the territory of the polling place about the date and place of voting and prepare the polling place for the voting process by setting up polling booths and ballot boxes. They also take measures to maintain order at the polling place on the election day.
The members of the electoral office of the polling place cannot be local councilors and party members. If the parties and other sociopolitical organizations do not propose their candidates for member of the electoral office note later than seven days before the expiration of the deadline by which the office can be constituted, the vacancies are filled by the local council. If this also does not present candidates, the vacancies on the electoral office are filled by the district electoral council at the suggestion of the Central Election Commission, from the Register of Electoral Functionaries.
The members of the electoral office also count the votes at the polling place when the elections are over, compile proceedings and reports and send them to the district electoral council together with all the ballots. They examine applications concerning the organization and holding of elections and adopt decisions on these, attaching copies of the decisions to the office’s report, and submit data about the voter turnout and the data needed for determining the preliminary election outcome to the district electoral council.
A number of 2,143 poling places will be established for the parliamentary elections of February 24, 2019. Of these, 47 are organized for voters from the localities situated on the left side of the Nistru, from Bender municipality and some of the villages of Căușeni district. Twenty-two polling places will be established in single-member constituency No. 47, Camenca, Râbnița, Dubăsari and Grigoriopol towns and 25 polling places for single-member constituency No. 48, Slobozia town and Tiraspol and Bender municipalities.
As many as 125 polling places will be opened abroad, namely 27 poling places in single-member constituency No. 49 eastwards Moldova, 83 polling places in single-member constituency No. 50 westwards Moldova and 15 polling places in single-member constituency No 51 the U.S. and Canada.
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The IPN division “Elections in plain words” is designed to explain notions, terms and practices related to the parliamentary elections based on the mixed electoral system and the consultative referendum that will take place on February 24, 2019.
