Bulgaria’s 2017 elections: Central Election Commission announces polling stations abroad
The United Kingdom will have the largest number of polling stations abroad in Bulgaria’s March 2017 early parliamentary elections, a total of 58, the Central Election Commission said on March 4.
As a country that is – for now – a member of the European Union, the UK is not subject to the limit of no more than 35 polling stations in a non-EU country. When the UK carries out Brexit and is no longer an EU member state, fewer polling stations will be available to Bulgarian expatriates, depending on developments and whatever further amendments to Bulgaria’s electoral laws the future may hold.
For Bulgaria’s March 26 2017 parliamentary elections, the largest number of notices of intention to vote abroad came from Turkey – more than 19 000 – but as a non-EU country, the number of polling stations will be at the statutory limit of 35.
In all, there will be 371 polling stations in foreign countries as Bulgarians go to the polls on March 26.
In the United States – also, quite obviously, a non-EU country – the limit of 35 polling stations applies.
In Spain, there will be 38 polling stations, in Germany 13, in Greece 21, in France 15, in Italy 13, in Austria 12 and in Belgium, eight.
The CEC decided that for these parliamentary elections, polling stations will not be opened in
Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria.
In Afghanistan, there were only two applications to vote. In Indonesia, also off the list, there was a grand total of one.
In all, the number of requests to vote abroad received by the CEC was 44 950. More than 19 000 came from Turkey, about 42 per cent of the total. From the UK, there were 5259 application, 3009 from Spain and close to 2800 from the US, followed by more than 2750 from Bulgarian citizens in Germany.
/Politics
