ARM-2003-1-001

a) Armenia / b) Constitutional Court / c)  / d) 16-04-2003 / e) DCC-412 / f) On the dispute on the results of the elections for President of the Republic of Armenia held on 5 March 2003 / g) Tegekagir (Official Gazette) / h) CODICES (English, French).

Keywords of the Systematic Thesaurus:

Keywords of the alphabetical index:

Election, presidential / Election, candidate, proxy / Election, unfair.

Headnotes:

Equal opportunity for candidates is closely connected to the formation of voters' opinions and assumes the neutrality of state bodies regarding the election process, specifically, the pre-election campaign and the media coverage. However, based on international legal standards, the principle, according to which the pre-election campaign must be just and fair, may not be interpreted in such a way as to exclude the freedom of speech and the right to receive information.

Each proxy of a candidate is a legal subject in some specific relationships and has rights and responsibilities only within the framework of those relationships. The Electoral Code was created on the basis of the presumption of reasonability and assumes that a proxy follows the work of an election commission on voting day in a given precinct. That proxy, not being directly legally connected to election processes in other precincts or constituencies, may not challenge results of other precincts or constituencies, much less dozens of them.

Voter lists filled in and already signed by voters are considered one of the elements of secrecy of the ballot and may not be published. However, this does not assume that voter lists may not be examined during checks performed in accordance with an order prescribed by the law.

Summary:

A candidate for President of Armenia applied to the Constitutional Court to have the elections for the President held on 5 March 2003 declared invalid. The applicant argued that in the course of preparation, organisation, execution and summarisation of the results of the elections, key principles of the electoral right laid down by the Constitution had been violated. In particular, the applicant alleged the following infringements of the Electoral Code.

In the course of the pre-election campaign, the principle of equality had been violated, and the candidates had not had been provided with conditions of free and fair competition for conducting the pre-election campaign. A number of proxies had been held in administrative detention for participation in unauthorised meetings and demonstrations.

A number of cases of one person voting instead of another, as well as open voting and ballot stuffing took place.

The applicant's proxies had been deprived of the opportunity to conduct an accurate monitoring of the election, in particular they faced obstacles in realising their right to request the checking of the conformity of precinct protocols with the results of elections.

The respondent, the Central Electoral Commission, challenged the applicant's allegations and argued the following.

In the course of the pre-election campaign, the principle of equality had been guaranteed by providing the candidates with equal rates of payable airtime, equal amounts of free airtime and equal extent of press coverage.

The allegation of the violation of the rights of persons who made requests for checks, was not true, since some requests had not been made within the time-limits provided by the law, and others had been made by persons who were not entitled to do so.

Concerning those issues, the Constitutional Court stated that it was obvious that each proxy was a legal subject in some specific relationships and had rights and responsibilities only within the framework of those relationships. The Electoral Code had been created on the basis of the presumption of reasonability and assumes that a proxy follows the work of an election commission on voting day in a given precinct. That proxy, not being directly legally connected to election processes in other precincts or constituencies, may not challenge the results of other precincts or constituencies, much less dozens of them.

Regarding the applicant's allegation as to the administrative detention of proxies for participation in unauthorised meetings and demonstrations, the Constitutional Court held that the administrative detentions for participation in unauthorised meetings and demonstrations were an interference with the right of freedom of peaceful assembly set out in [ENG-ECH-0-11] Article 11 ECHR.

The Constitutional Court found that the provision to receive copies of documents set out in Article 30 of the Electoral Code referred to session protocols and protected the legal position approved in October 2002 by the Council of Europe's Venice Commission's Plenary Session, in accordance to which voter lists filled in and already signed by voters are considered one of the elements of secrecy of the ballot and may not be published. However, that does not assume that voter lists may not be examined during checks performed in accordance with an order prescribed by the law.

Based on the results of the investigation of the case, the Constitutional Court decided that during the 2003 Presidential Election, in individual precincts, in particular during the voting and the vote count, violations had occurred that were not compatible with future democratic developments of the country. Those violations were incompatible with, in particular, the obligations undertaken by Armenia under [ENG-UNO-A-21] Article 21 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, [ENG-ECH-1-3] Article 3 Protocol 1 ECHR and [ENG-UNO-B-25] Article 25 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

The Constitutional Court decided, in order to assess the impact of the unreliable results on the overall results of elections, to reduce the total difference in votes cast for candidates by the number of votes cast for the candidate who received more votes in such precincts.

The Constitutional Court also decided that in order to identify all persons who committed election fraud and violations and to hold them accountable as prescribed by the law, the Constitutional Court would make materials available to the Office of Prosecutor General for the purpose of its undertaking a complex investigation and informing the Constitutional Court and the public of the results of its investigation.

Considering the actual difference in votes for Presidential candidates in the 5 March 2003 election results, the impact thereon of the size of discrepancies and the results recognised to be unreliable in an examination of the case by the court and assessing the impact of duly legally formulated and proven electoral violations of a qualitative nature of the realisation of active and passive electoral rights, the Court upheld the Central Electoral Commission's Decision on the election of the Armenian President.

Languages:

Armenian, English, French (translation by the Court).