BAKU, Azerbaijan, September 1. Today is a real holiday in Azerbaijan, and I have already managed to communicate with representatives of parties, the legal community, students, and military men, and all of them waited for this day as a day of sincere expression of people's will, realizing the responsibility that falls on every citizen of the Republic of Azerbaijan for the election to the Azerbaijani Parliament, the Deputy Chairperson of the Council of the Republic of the National Assembly Sergei Khomenko said, Trend reports.
“In the context of this level of responsibility, everyone said that true patriots of Azerbaijan should be represented in the parliament. It is quite symbolic that we are now on the territory that is now recovering from military actions. We can see the progress that is being made on the Karabakh land. We are now in the building of a beautiful school, and the school is the place where the future of the republic is formed. Being in such a building, the citizens will always remember that the state cares about them, and the deputies of the parliament are the true conductors of the will of the people. We are witnessing a promising level of organization.
All polling stations we visited are equipped under the Electoral Code of Azerbaijan, and public order is ensured. All the way from Baku to Fuzuli, we observed the festive mood of people—the kind of order that should be present on election day in any state," Khomenko emphasized.
On June 28, President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev signed a decree dissolving the sixth convocation of the Azerbaijani Parliament and scheduling the extraordinary election for September 1.
Azerbaijan has 6,421,960 registered voters, including 374 who turned 18 on the election day. There are 6,478 polling stations, comprising 6,343 permanent and 135 temporary locations.
In the territories liberated from occupation, 54 permanent polling stations are set up. There are 10 electoral districts for internally displaced persons (IDPs), with 574 IDP polling stations serving 397,862 voters. More than 42,000 voters will cast their ballots in the liberated areas.
A total of 51,141 voters will participate for the first time in the extraordinary parliamentary election. The oldest female voter is 134 years old, and the oldest voter is 109 years old.
Exit polls will be conducted at approximately 2,500 polling stations. Three international organizations are registered to carry out these polls: the Citizens' Labor Rights Protection League, together with Oracle Advisory Group (US), and the "Tereggi" Public Association for Social Research, in collaboration with the Italian SWG S.p.A. research company.
A total of 112,749 local observers have been registered, including over 65,000 representatives of political parties. There are 598 international observers from 51 organizations and 69 countries, including 227 from OSCE/ODIHR and 61 from OSCE PA.
Among the 990 registered candidates, 305 represent 25 political parties, while 371 are party members but were not nominated by their parties. In total, 676 candidates are affiliated with political parties.
Webcams have been installed at 1,000 polling stations nationwide to allow direct and continuous observation of the voting process without requiring registration.
Portable ballot boxes will be used across all polling stations for the parliamentary election on September 1.
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