Polls Close in Montenegro General Elections

After 13 hours, 1,165 polling stations closed their doors at 8pm for 514,055 registered voters in Montenegro.  

The Centre for Monitoring, CEMI, a local NGO, is expected to publish the first unofficial result indications after 9 pm on Sunday.

The latest CEMI figures showed that 66,2 per cent of the electorate voted by 7 pm which is 3 percent more in comparison to the voter turnout in the last elections in 2009.

The highest turnout by 7 pm was recorded in the central part of the country - 70,1percent, which is 7 percent higher than in the previous elections, the CEMI stated.

According to the State Electoral Commission 275,818 people or 53,66 per cent of the electorate voted by 5 pm, similar as in the elections in 2009 when voter turnout by 5 pm was 54,5 per cent of the electorate.

No major irregularities have occurred.  The CEMI reported minor irregularities, including several cases where people voted twice or polling stations were not opened on time, while one brawl was reported at a polling station in the northern town of Kolasin.

During the election day, 12 persons from the Bijelo Polje prison went on hunger strike after claiming that they were not allowed to vote.

The main controversy of the election day, however, were exit polling tactics employed by the teaching staff and students of Faculty of Political Science, University of Montenegro.

Pollsters were filmed interviewing people at a polling station, although the State Electoral Commission previously said that exit polls should be conducted at least 50 meters away from the polling stations.

The CEMI made a complaint to the State Electoral Commission, and the voting at the polling stations were such exit polls were conducted may be annulled.

Montenegrins voted for 13 election contenders. The parties must pass a 3-per-cent threshold to win any of the 81 seats in the parliament.

The ruling Democratic Party of Socialists, DPS, and the Social Democratic Party, SDP, which together formed the last five governments, are fighting to retain power, running together with a new ally, the Liberal Party, in a coalition named "European Montenegro".

Despite some attempts, the main opposition parties have failed to unite.

The Socialist People’s Party, SNP, the Democratic Front, and Positive Montenegro, PCG, all ran separately.

Parliament, whose mandate was supposed to expire in March 2013, called an early elections in order to enable a new full-term government to conduct EU membership talks, which opened on June 29.

The election campaign geared up from mid-September. The OSCE's Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, OSCE/ODIHR, described it as “democratically correct”.

The new electoral law, adopted last September, retains a variant of the proportional representation formula, which slightly favours whichever political force wins most electoral support.

However, it includes some important changes. Ethnic Albanians, who make up 5 per cent of the population, have lost their five guaranteed seats.

Instead, all ethnic minorities that comprise up to 15 percent of the population are given preferential treatment. Those are, primarily, the Albanian, Bosniak [Muslim] and Croat communities.

Apart from a new national government, locals in Budva, Niksic and Kotor also voted for the new municipal authorities on Sunday.