Presentation by Leonid Markaryan,
Member of the Central Election Commission of Kosovo,
Head of Political Parties Registration Unit of the United
Nations Civil Administration in Kosovo

Mr.Chairman,
Ladies and Gentlemen, Colleagues,

At the outset let me thank the Secretariat of the Association of Central and Eastern European Election Officials, the International Foundation for Election Systems and the National Electoral Commission of Poland for the invitation extended to the CEC of Kosovo to participate in the Annual Conference of ACEEEO.

We regard this  wonderful opportunity as a considerate friendly gesture of our colleagues from Central and Eastern Europe, who have been working under the auspices of the Association  to bolster the process of election systems and technologies development throughout the European Continent.

Participation of the members of the CEC of Kosovo in the work of this forum today might hopefully, in the not too distant future, set off the process of integration of your Kosovo counterparts into the community of the election officials  of Europe.

The CEC of Kosovo was established on 18 April, 2000 by the Regulation  of the Special Representative of the UN Secretary General No. 2000/21 „On the Establishment of the Central Election Commission” and in compliance with the UN Security Council Resolution 1244.  It is composed of nine members from Kosovo and three international memebers.  The term of office of the Commission is 2 years. The Chairperson of the CEC is the Director of the UNMIK Institution Building (OSCE).

The first official meeting of the CEC took place on April 18, though it had been preceded by two organizational meetings, held pending entry into force of the said Regulation.

According to the Regulation the CEC is responsible for establishing the electoral rules for the conduct of elections in Kosovo including design of sensitive electoral material, ballot papers, accreditation of domestic and foreign observers, registration of political parties, coalitions, candidates and citizen’s initiatives, establishing competent authorities responsible for the conduct of elections, such as Municipal Election Commissions and polling station committees, voter registration provisions, polling and counting procedures, voter information,  electoral code of conduct and creation of an electoral complaints body to  ensure that actions are taken to address any violation of electoral rules or any other rules governing the elections.

The chief objective of the Commission is to provide the people of Kosovo with an effective mechanism of democratic transformation of the post-war Kosovo society and to create the necessary conditions for local self-governance.

UNMIK Pillar 2, which is the Civil Administration and Pillar 3, Institution Building spared no effort to ensure that the CEC became fully operational to meet the requirements assigned to it by all UNMIK regulations and administrative directions pertainning to the forthcoming electoral exercise.

Special thanks have to be given to IFES, whose President Richard Soudriette we have the pleasure of having with us at this conference. The experts of the Foundation contribute all their knowledge and experience IFES had accumulated over many years, into the process of civil and voter registration and preparation for the conduct of elections in Kosovo.

The CEC meetings take place regularly once a week in the premises of the OSCE. The copies of the documents to be discussed at each following meeting are translated into the local languages and submitted by the Election Secretariat to the members 3-5 days in advance. Thus the local commissioners have sufficient opportunity to familiarize themselves with the issues to be discussed to  come up with their comments during the CEC meetings.

Discussions at the meetings are held in businesslike and consistent spirit, enabling the CEC to forge ahead with adoption of electoral rules at a fairly fast pace to meet the envisaged timelines.

It has also to be noted that the local commissioners over the period of the CEC’s functioning have been invariably demonstrating political maturity, impartiality and awareness of the complexities of the situation in Kosovo and of the upcoming municipal elections.

While acknowledging the current activities and law-making process conducted by the CEC as very positive, there’s a lot to accomplish before 1 August – the official deadline,  after which no changes are supposed to be made in the ballot papers. Greater heed is to be paid to the municipal election commissions, whose work at this grass-root level, including that of the functioning of the polling stations committees will be a  yardstick to measure the efficiency, transparency and fairness of the elections.

The progress in moving towards the election day will depend to a large extent on the timely completion of the civil and voter registration currently underway throughout Kosovo. As of last week over 500.000 people were registered at 200 static and mobile Kosovo-wide registration centers, which  meets the envisaged registration timelines.

Democratic transformations in Kosovo would not be feasible without an active participation in the election process of political parties of Kosovo.  And I am proud to say that we now have 29 parties, representing a broad political and ethnic spectrum of the Kosovo society vying for municipal seats in October, provided they will be able to present to the Registration Office of UNMIK and the CEC the minimum of 4,000 valid signatures of their supporters, reqiredunder the existing Regulation.. To facilitate the process of small and ethnic minorities parties getting seats in the local legislatures, the CEC has decided to have list proportional representation system with the application of the Saint-Lague electoral formula, which favors small parties.

In closing I would like  once again to express our gratitude to the organizers of the Conference for inviting us over and for the hospitality accorded to us by the hosts of this event. It has been a pleasure to see many of the colleagues here whom I had known from before and to have made new friends.

Back in Kosovo, I will report to the Special Representative of the Secretary General Dr. B.Koucner on what has been discussed both at the Conference and in our conversation yesterday with Mr.Richard Soudriette, President of IFES and Mr. Zoltan Toth the General Secretary of the ACEEEO pertaining to Kosovo elections.

I hope that this first meeting with our colleagues from the CECs of Central and  Eastern European countries will pave  way to a future continuous  cooperation between the Association and the CEC of Kosovo.