The Sectional Election Commissions (SEC) will carry out a manual control counting of machine receipts for the purpose of full transparency and the possibility of comparing the data. This was explained to the Bulgarian National Radio by the spokesperson of the Central Election Commission (CEC), Stoyanka Balova-Tsvetkova.
The data from this control counting will be entered into a protocol, which will be scanned together with the paper protocol at the counting points of the District Election Commissions (DECs). In this way, the results will be recorded, but the official result of the vote will be strictly reported from the machine's protocol.
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Balova pointed out that the machine report allows for faster and more accurate processing of the results, with the control count aimed at avoiding possible errors due to fatigue among the commission members. To increase efficiency, the CEC is planning in-person training on the ground for RECs and SICs. In the event of a technical failure of a machine, if the problem is not fixed by a technician within a few minutes, voting in the section will switch to paper ballots.
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Regarding the members of the section election commissions, Balova commented that the chairman will receive 185 euros, and the members - 160 euros. If the protocol is correct, there is a 15 euro bonus for each member of the commission.
In connection with the campaign, the CEM will strictly monitor media providers. For the spending of media packages (worth about 21 thousand euros for parties without subsidies and initiative committees), the CEC has created a new public register. Information about the amounts, candidates and media formats will be updated on the commission's website every Tuesday.