Voter turnout about 45%: 37 seats to DPS, four to SD

Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS) has scored a landslide win in local elections in Niksic that were specific because only DPS and Social Democrats (SD) participated in the process. The opposition boycotted voting in Niksic.

Based on 98.58% of ballots counted, DPS and SD won 20,775 and 2,291 votes respectively. Thus, the Municipal Assembly will consist of 37 DPS and four SD councillors. There were 2,813 invalid ballots.

According to the Municipal Election Commission’s data based on 98% of the processed electorate, voter turnout was 44.96%.

Immediately after the closing of polling stations, DPS representatives Veselin Grbovic, Radivoje Lala Nikcevic and Milutin Simovic held a press conference. DPS official Milutin Simovic said that this was a new defeat of those who lost general elections in October. Grbovic, the incumbent municipal president and the first candidate at DPS electoral roll in Niksic, pointed out that the opposition provided legitimacy to the elections by participating in polling boards.

SD representatives were also satisfied. SD won 2,291 votes at the local elections in Niksic, said the party leader Ivan Brajovic, adding that the opposition parties that boycotted voting were losers of the elections.

However, according to the Democratic Front (DF) official Milutin Djukanovic, DPS did not succeed to “win” Niksic. The voter turnout of 45% means that citizens do not support this government, he said.

“There were no major irregularities at the polling stations and the elections were held as planned,” the president of the Municipal Electoral Commission Srdjan Spajic said.

The opposition was boycotting the voting but it took part in observing the elections – 67 out of 138 polling board chairmen were opposition representatives.

The total of 58,486 citizens has voting right in Niksic.

By 9am, 11am and 3pm, voter turnout was 9%, 20% and 35% respectively.

By comparison, in the parliamentary elections held on 16 October 2016, the voter turnout in Niksic was 14% by 10am, whereas 29% and 46.5% citizens voted by noon and 3pm respectively.

Mobile teams of the Centre for Democratic Transition (CDT) were visiting polling stations.

“For the time being, we can say that voting at the polling stations we have visited places was without incidents, devices for voter electronic identification are functioning and there are no delays in the process,” executive director of the NGO, Milica Kovacevic, wrote in the CDT Viber chat group during the day.

“Communication among the members of polling boards has been fair and professional,” said Dragan Koprivica.

In these elections, CDT had no observers in polling boards. They were just visiting the polling stations in order to get a picture on the electoral process.

All 138 polling stations were open, although at several of them voting was temporary delayed.

Among others, at the polling station in the Luka Simonovic elementary school the voting was delayed because the polling board chairman Spasoje Tomic (a New Serb Democracy (NOVA) representative) complained about promotional billboards being in front of the school.

At about 7:25am, the firemen and employees of a private company with a crane came and removed the election propaganda materials. The polling station was regularly opened after that.