/ world today news/ The most influential expatriate organization in Turkey, Balgoç, announced its decision to file a lawsuit in Bulgaria and the European Court of Human Rights due to the discriminatory and anti-democratic conditions of the elections that the dual citizens faced.
In the statement distributed to the Turkish media, the extreme dissatisfaction with the CEC’s shock decision, taken the day before the vote, to fill in the declarations for participation in it abroad in Bulgarian, which obliged dual citizens living in Turkey to use the Cyrillic alphabet as well.
This led them to great confusion, because of a wrong letter, the commissions forced the voters to fill in the document again, declaring that they had not voted in another place, and other people were not allowed to help them, so the stay of one person in the room reached 27 minutes, the statement said. And also that it was more than the obvious ill-intentioned attitude of certain members of the commissions, who did everything possible to delay and sabotage the voting process, due to which hundreds of people could not reach the polls and were forced to go home.
“The committees attacked the people in the queues with nonsensical explanations and warnings, certain members were extremely rude to them and presented themselves as communist militias. Their approach was in the style of repressions from the time of the totalitarian regime in Bulgaria. Despite everything, the voters armed themselves with patience and waited for hours, there were fainting, emergency medical teams arrived. Envoys of the Helsinki Committee also faced the impossibility of fulfilling their observer mission. It got to the point that chairpersons of election commissions went to the toilet every 15 minutes, and during their absence from the voting premises no voters were allowed inside.
In the Bulgarian diplomatic missions, despite the obligation of impartiality, once again committee chairmen were constantly receiving instructions by phone from one party and we have evidence of this, the same party organized the protests. At 8 p.m., queues of voters outside the polling stations were still there, but people were not allowed to vote, thus disenfranchised. Because of all this, we have the real grounds to file complaints against Bulgaria both in the Bulgarian and the European Court of Human Rights,” stated Balgoch’s statement.
The insistence that the members of the election commissions be investigated because of the real obstacles and the discriminatory treatment of dual citizens, and that legal proceedings be initiated against them, is emphasized.
“Bulgarian democracy and its state institutions must take measures to protect compatriots expelled from their country. Despite the suffering caused by the totalitarian regime and forced emigration, they keep their love for the homeland and believe that democracy means equal treatment and good treatment for all,” the statement added.
Bursa / Turkey
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