Presidential: CNE receives complaints from voters barred from early vote by confinement

Jornal Económico with Lusa 17 January 2021, 20:25

The National Elections Commission (CNE) today received several complaints from citizens who cannot vote complaining about incomplete information about the deadlines for registration in the early vote in confinement for the presidential elections.

To the Lusa agency, João Tiago Machado, from the CNE, confirmed that complaints were received, without giving any numbers, which will be analyzed by the commission at its meeting next Tuesday.

One of the complaints, to which Lusa had access, was presented by the citizen Diogo Martins who criticizes the lack of information “or“ false information ”) that led him to be deprived of his“ constitutional right to vote ”, despite being in confinement mandatory under the covid-19 pandemic containment measures.

The home page of the website https://www.votoantecipado.mai.gov.pt/, and also that of the CNE, informs that citizens in compulsory confinement can request early voting (after being collected at home) between 14 and 17 January , that is, today, but this is “information that turns out to be false”.

However, the law that regulates this early voting stipulates that only those who have been confined by health authorities until Thursday, 14 January can ask for early voting.

In other words, anyone who was confined after Thursday, either because he was sick or because of prophylactic isolation (because he had contact with an infected person), will no longer be able to ask to vote in advance.

“This detail, which prevents me from registering for early voting because I only entered mandatory confinement on the 15th, is never explained in the communication that the authorities have made with voters”, complains Diogo Martins.

Throughout today, and even earlier, the Lusa agency received information from citizens in the same situation as Diogo Martins. In some cases, to whom he sent a request for information to the CNE, they were informed that they did not fulfill all conditions, that is, they were confined after Thursday.

In other cases, it was the wrong filling of the request for early voting on mobility instead of early voting for voters in mandatory confinement.

João Tiago Machado also stated that the CNE received complaints from other cases of citizens whose confinement may not be updated in the health databases.

More than 19 people in confinement due to the covid-XNUMX pandemic registered for early voting in next Sunday's presidential elections, the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MAI) said today.

The deadline for registration ends today at the end of the day and until 24:00 on Saturday the electoral administration had received 10.334 requests, according to information from the MAI.

Voters in compulsory confinement determined by the health authorities due to covid-19, have to express their intention to vote in advance between January 14, Thursday, and today until 00:00 today.

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