On Saturday, Parliament held an emergency session over draft-changes to the Electoral Code. However, they were not adopted. Though there were 67 votes in favour and 18 against, since there was no Badinter majority, the text was not supported.
According to the initial proposal, filed by the ruling majority, the minimum threshold for signatures collected by independent candidates was 0.95% of voters in an electoral district. However, Levica’s amendment, accepted by all except DUI, provided for a 0.5% threshold.
The ruling coalition’s stand is that a successful election process, not percentages, is what’s important, while SDSM described it as a way to avoid the legal vacuum created by the Constitutional Court’s decision.
However, DUI described decisions as self-will by the government, saying political consensus wasn’t reached. On Sunday, at a session that started at around 7 pm, the SEC decided that two signatures from two voters would be required for independents to be able to participate in the local elections.