UPDATE: Elections incidents in the Republic of Moldova: one single voter has been listed 52 times on electoral lists, blocked access to voting sections, invalid lists and vote bulletins only in Russian

UPDATE The Observes for Civic Coalition for Free and Correct Elections – „Coalitia 2009” – notes multiple errors in the electoral lists. One of the most outrageous occurred in section no. 7 from Cimislia, where the observer for Human Rights Defence from Moldova League (L.A.D.O.M) informs that a voter has been featured 52 times with different ID data.

The first incidents of the Republic of Moldova elections took place in Corjova, Dubasari, where unidentified persons blocked the access to the voting section set up in „Mihai Eminescu” high school, according to Moldovan publication Jurnalul de Chisinau. The Central electoral commission decided that people in Corjova may vote in Cocieri and in Ustia village, also in Dubasari.

The decision was taken during an extraordinary session taken by the electoral commission in Dubasari region. The commission believe non-constitutional authorities from Tirasaspol blocked this morning the electoral section in Corjova. The commission informed the General Porsecutors Office on the event.

Vladimir Voronin, Moldova’s current president, told the press that this was a traditional situation and that the only option was for voters to stamp their choice in a neighbouring town.

Jurnalul de Chisinau read that a similar situation took place during the 5th of April’s elections, when the voting section was blocked by 300 persons before it had the chance to open. The protesters cut the electricity connections and took out the ballot box.

Here are other noted incidents:

• in a voting section in Leova, there are unknown persons attached to a voter’s address; the same thing happened in Chisinau;

• a citizen was refused the right to vote in Chisinau’s voting section no. 62 because the electoral list was conceived wrongly: his ID number was invalid;

• there were deceased listed for voting;

• in Moseni village, Rascani region, the voting section had only vote bulletins written in Russian;

• in Chisinau, a voter coming to the ballot section no. 27 discovered that, according to the voting list, in his apartment lived another voter;

• for voting section no. 40 in Soroca town, 50 meters away from the section, Communist representatives urge voters to help themselves with alcohol and vote for the Communist Party;

• at a voting section in Cocieri, four ambulances had to transport mentally challenged patients from a nearby institution for them to vote, and they voted as they have been requested.