Around 84 thousand Turkish Cypriots are expected to have the right to vote in the European elections of June 9, 2024 according to information obtained by Offsite News from the Elections Service. In particular, the European elections are the only electoral contest in Cyprus in which since 2014 Turkish Cypriots who have an identity card of the Republic and reside in the Occupied Territories have the right to vote.
According to the legislation for the European elections, there is a Special Electoral List in which the citizens of the Republic who live in the occupied territories and have already completed or will complete by the date of the elections their 18th year of age and possess an identity card of the Republic they are automatically registered in a special list and exercise the right to vote in special operating polling stations.
In fact, unlike the rest of the electorate, the Turkish Cypriots are not allocated to specific electoral centers andThey can vote in any special election center and to avoid double voting in these centers an electronic electoral roll is used.
Specifically, in special election centers based on the information from the election service, na have more than 83 thousand Turkish Cypriots.
At the same time the right to vote in the European elections as in the other electoral contests, they still have 730 Turkish Cypriots who live in the free areas and are distributed in the electoral centers.
However, it should be noted that in recent days, due to the debate in the Interior Committee on an amending bill for the election of members of the European Parliament, a proposal was made by the Ministry of the Interior to remove the provision in the legislation that Ms.at the time of their attendance at the polling stations, Turkish Cypriots residing in the Occupied Territories must fill in an additional responsible statement for their address of residence.
However, after reactions from parties, the Ministry of the Interior did not remove the specific provision, which brought the reaction of AKEL which argued that with this practice queues are created and many leave without voting.
At the same time, the Ministry of the Interior and the Elections Service asked the Parliament to vote on the harmonizing law, the passing of which was postponed twice by the Plenary Assembly as well as by the States EU members only Cyprus and Spain have not proceeded with its adoption.
Stelios Stylianou/ OFFSITE.NEWS
