The preparations for the elections to the Jogorku Kenesh, scheduled for October 4, 2020, are gaining momentum. Within 5 days since the day of scheduling the elections, 44 political parties notified the Central Election Commission (the CEC) of their intention to take part in the elections and until August 20, 23 political parties held their congresses and nominated their parliamentary candidates, while other parties decided not to continue the race. By August 25, parties should submit their documents to the CEC, which in turn by September 4 has to register eligible candidates. The most active phase of the electoral process i.e. campaigning will start after all candidates are registered.

Meanwhile the Central Election Commission continues with the preparations to organize the elections, in particular training and informing all actors in the electoral process. For example, prior to the party congresses, the CEC, in cooperation with the “Civic Platform” Public Foundation and with the support from the United Nations Development Program, the Governments of Germany, Switzerland and Japan conducted a public dialogue with the political parties on the integrity of the electoral process and transparency in campaign financing, calling on parties to abstain from using administrative resources and bribing voters, to respect themselves, their peers and the voters who deserve respect and the right to better future. 

During the public dialogue the participants discussed the rules of financing the election campaign and the recommendations on holding the political party congresses, while the Central Election Commission presented a unique system called “E-Candidate”, which allows the political parties to easily and simply create the lists of their candidates. To enter the information about a candidate it is enough to enter a personal identification number of a citizen and all the necessary information available in other governmental databases will be automatically filled. The system allows the political parties to monitor the compliance with the law on representation of persons of other sex, youth, ethnic minorities and persons with disabilities. If a potential candidate does not meet the criteria envisaged in the law, for example, has a criminal record or does not have Kyrgyz citizenship, the system will “prompt” the political party about it.

With the support from UNDP, the Central Election Commission continues to train political parties in electoral campaign financing, advocacy and the resolution of electoral disputes. For example, in cooperation with the “Civic Platform” Public Foundation, five workshops have already been held for the representatives of political parties, during which the political parties were able to discuss the formation and spending of electoral funds, payment of electoral pledge and campaigning. Four trainings were also held for political parties on handling the electoral disputes by election commissions, law enforcement agencies and courts, the responsibility for electoral offences, including abuse of administrative resources and vote buying.

At the same time, polling stations prepare for the voting day and the voter lists are being updated. A novelty of this electoral process is equipping each polling station with a tablet, which was made possible with the support of UNDP and the Government of Japan. The tablets have a set of uploaded training materials, including a 16-epizode film on electoral procedures for the members of precinct election commissions. The members of the commission are trained with the tablet connected to the wall screen. In addition, the tablet allows the precinct election commissions to be in permanent contact with the Central and Territorial Election Commissions and quickly get qualified assistance through messengers.

Particular attention is paid to the accessibility of the electoral process, in particular the equipping of polling stations with ramps, magnifying glasses, Braille stencils for ballot paper filling, special voting booths and additional lighting as well as a call button for help for persons with disabilities.

The Chairperson of the Central Election Commission conducts personal meetings with the members of territorial and precinct election commissions to discuss the most important aspects of preparing and organizing the elections. For instance, in the context of the coronavirus pandemic, special attention is paid to ensuring sanitary and epidemiological norms when accepting applications to correct inaccuracies in the voter list and change the address of voting, as well as on the day of voting. More specifically, each polling station is equipped with a sanitizer device, members of precinct election commissions shall have masks and gloves and the premises are regularly disinfected. The same applies to the voter identification equipment; in particular the fingerprint scanner is processed with alcohol wipes before and after each voter uses it. On the election day the employees of the sanitary and epidemiological station will carry out temperature control of voters. In addition, in order to ensure social distancing, the territory of the polling station will have special markings to keep the distance of 1.5 - 2 meters. The Chairperson of the Central Election Commission explains to the members of precincts how to properly mark the territory of the polling station and how to better arrange the equipment.

The Central Election Commission has an operating hotline, which, inter alia, provides advice to women and migrant voters. Calls from the Russian Federation and Kazakhstan are free and the some migrants have already received consultations on their voting rights. The Chairperson of the CEC and the representatives of Kyrgyz diasporas abroad continue to have weekly meetings. During these meetings, voters living abroad have an opportunity to ask various questions related to biometric and consular registration, which are two mandatory conditions for inclusion in the voter lists.

Professional and impartial security is an integral part of the electoral process. Therefore, the training of law enforcement officials the planning processes and the functions of ensuring the electoral security is an important step in the preparedness of the security forces to respond effectively to threats emerging during the elections. The law enforcement agencies largely determine the integrity and fairness of the ongoing electoral process. The Central Election Commission, in cooperation with the Office of the Prosecutor General, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the “Civic Platform” Public Foundation, supported by UNDP and the OSCE Program Office in Bishkek, is conducting training for senior law enforcement officers, followed by training for rank-and-file police staff who will directly ensure observance of law and order on voting day.

Meanwhile, the young people of Kyrgyzstan, within the framework of the Youth Lab organized by the Central Election Commission and UNDP, are conducting the awareness campaign to combat electoral offences, in particular bribery of voters and violations of the voting secrecy. The majority of the participants in the Youth Lab have created videos that are actively distributed on Facebook and Instagram platforms under the hash tags #голосуй and #шайла. In their video messages, young people describe the consequences of selling votes and why it is important not to do that.