The electoral provisions regarding the place of exercise of the right to vote says that citizens can vote in the settlement where they are domiciled. At the same time, if the voter is domiciled in a certain place, but resides in another, during the period of validity of the residence, he or she votes in the settlement where the residence is. In these conditions, the Promo-LEX Observation Mission of the general local and the new parliamentary elections of October 20 and November 3, 2019, warned of the uncertainties regarding the place of voting of the citizens. In its sixth report, the Mission recommended applying for the local ballot the special rule by which the right to vote in elections is conditioned by where the voter's domicile is, not by the residence.
In an IPN press conference, the head of the Promo-LEX Election Observation Mission, Pavel Postica, said that the uncertainty regarding the place of voting is due to the poor interpretation of the article in the Electoral Code which stipulates that voters do not participate in general local elections if they don't domicile on the territory of the constituency, in the corresponding settlement. "Again, we stumble upon the same problematic situation - what prevails, the domicile or the residence? What does it mean not to domicile?", asked Pavel Postica.
"In our view, the Parliament must review this rule and establish clarity - what prevails in general local elections, domicile or residence? We encountered many situations when it seems that the residence prevails and some when the domicile prevails", explained the head of the Mission.
According to the Observation Mission, there are reasonable suspicions regarding cases of artificial migration of citizens in the context of the general local elections of October 20, 2019. Following the analysis of official data on the internal mechanical movement of the number of citizens for the period August 19, 2019 - October 10, 2019, contrary to common practice specific to the majority of the territorial administrative units of level I, in at least 29 settlements there were at least three residence registration requests and additional requests for domicile registration.
According to Pavel Postica, in the second round of the November 3 local elections, the Promo-LEX Mission will have 40 mobile teams that will monitor the electoral process in more than 380 first and second level constituencies. Short-term observers will monitor only inside the polling stations open in Chișinău and in its suburbs. Additionally, observers will conduct parallel vote counting for the position of general mayor of Chișinău. Thus, 307 short-term observers will be delegated on election day.
