BAKU, Azerbaijan, Mar. 5
By Elchin Mehdiyev – Trend:
Azerbaijan’s Central Election Commission (CEC) prepared the Calendar Plan for elections to the Parliament and took the necessary steps to hold democratic and fair parliamentary elections, CEC Chairman Mazahir Panahov said, Trend reports on Mar. 5.
He made the remark speaking at a meeting on special constitutional office work of the Plenum of the Constitutional Court in connection with the verification of documents and approval of the election results submitted by the CEC to the Constitutional Court in connection with the parliamentary elections held on February 9.
Panahov noted that the process of nomination and registration of candidates was carried out in accordance with the Electoral Code, and 1,314 candidates participated in the elections.
In connection with the election campaign, necessary conditions were created for the candidates, and there were no restrictions for their meetings with voters, the chairman added.
Panahov said that all conditions have been created to use the media’s ability to campaign candidates.
The candidacies of 246 people were nominated by 19 political parties, 1,057 were self-nominated, 11 - by initiative groups. Twenty-one percent accounted for female candidates while 79 percent – male candidates.
Some 883 international observers and 77,790 local observers monitored the voting process. Among the local observers, 35,152 were representatives of political parties. International observers represented 58 countries and 59 organizations.
Exit polls were conducted by AJF & Associates Inc. (US) jointly with Citizens' Labor Rights Protection League, the Rey Monitoring Center, and the French OpinionWay Research Institute together with the “Human Rights in the XXI Century – Azerbaijan” Foundation.