BNS: Early voting in Lithuania's presidential elections kicking off Wednesday
Updated 2009-05-18
VILNIUS, May 13, BNS - Early voting in the first round of presidential elections is opening in Lithuania on Wednesday. Voters who will be unable to come to their local polling station on Sunday have an opportunity to vote at any municipality between 12 p.m. and 8 p.m. on Wednesday and Thursday.
Voters who have not received their voters' certificates at home may print them on the website of the Central Electoral Committee by entering their personal data. Wednesday also marks the start of voting in special post offices for registered voters currently in hospitals, social care and wardship institutions, as well as those on mandatory military service, serving sentences in penitentiaries or prisons. Such type of voting will end on Friday.
Voters whose old age or health condition prevented them from coming to polling stations will be able to vote at home on Friday and Saturday. Those wanting to cast ballots at home should notify their local electoral body.
Lithuanians living in or visiting foreign countries can also vote by post or in the country's diplomatic missions abroad. Voting in diplomatic missions has already started and will close at 8 p.m. Lithuanian time on Sunday.
Voting on the official election day, Sunday, will take place between 7 a.m. and 8 p.m. in polling stations across Lithuania.
The presidential candidate who, during the first voting in which not less than half of all the voters participate, receives the votes of more than half of all the voters who participated in the election, shall be deemed elected. If less than half of all the voters participate in the election, the candidate who receives the greatest number of votes, but not less than 1/3 of the votes of all the voters, is deemed elected.
If, during the first voting round, no single candidate gets the requisite number of votes, a repeat voting shall be held after two weeks pitting the two candidates who received the greatest number of votes against each other. The candidate who receives more votes thereafter is deemed elected.
The electoral body has registered the following seven hopefuls for the elections, namely European Commissioner Dalia Grybauskaite running as an independent candidate, the Labor Party's candidate Loreta Grauziniene, the Social Democratic Party's leader Algirdas Butkevicius, the Order and Justice Party's candidate Valentinas Mazuronis, the Lithuanian Poles' Electoral Action leader Valdemar Tomasevski, Retired Brigadier General Ceslovas Jezerskas running as an independent candidate and former leader of the
Lithuanian Farmers' National Union, Kazimira Prunskiene.
If needed, the second round of presidential elections is planned for June 7 in conjunction with the elections to the European Parliament. There are 2,686,346 registered voters in Lithuania.
