Skopje, 27 October 2025 (MIA) – The State Election Commission (SEC) will release on Tuesday the final results of the voting in each municipality from the first round of the local elections held on October 19, SEC head Boris Kondarko said at Monday’s 150th session.

“The SEC informs the public that we had planned to announce today the final results for all municipalities, following the completion of procedures on complaints and cases before the Administrative Court. However, as court hearings are still underway and will continue until late tonight, I propose that we postpone this agenda item until tomorrow’s continuation of the session. By the end of today, we will have compiled all final results following the completion of legal procedures before the Administrative Court. Tomorrow, the SEC will present a full overview of results in municipalities without lawsuits, where voting is complete and where a second round will take place. Still, we must wait for the Administrative Court’s decisions today before announcing the final results for each municipality,” Kondarko stated.

SEC members adopted a decision to dismiss the election board members at two polling stations in Shuto Orizari municipality.

“Following the Administrative Court’s decision to annul the voting at these polling stations, the SEC believes it must take steps to properly organize the second-round voting in Shuto Orizari. In accordance with the law and to ensure the legality of the process, we consider that there were shortcomings in the conduct of the elections at the two polling stations where the court annulled the vote. The State Election Commission must intervene and designate new election boards to conduct the voting at these two polling stations. Polling station 2962 concerns the voting procedure for the election of mayor, while polling station 2966 concerns the results for the election of council members,” Kondarko noted.

He also informed that, in consultation with the respective municipal election commissions where no second round of voting will be held, the State Election Commission will tomorrow appoint new election boards composed of members from other municipal commissions that successfully conducted the voting. Kondarko emphasized that, regarding the appointment of the two polling stations, the SEC will not use election boards from the Shuto Orizari municipal election commission, nor will new ones be chosen at random. Instead, the voting will be conducted by election boards delegated from another municipal election commission that already has experience and was recommended by commissions that carried out the voting without any problems.

“The Prosecutor’s Office may treat this as information received ex officio. Even without a special report from us, it can take interest, and we will provide full documentation to determine whether these irregularities occurred accidentally or intentionally, by whom and when, and whether there is basis for accountability. This is a clear message that illegal actions by election boards will not be tolerated, they will be dismissed, and all necessary measures will be taken to safeguard the legality of the electoral process,” Kondarko stated.

So far, 1,565 observers have been accredited: 94 domestic and 651 international, including 14 foreign journalists. Today, the SEC approved six observers for the European Parliament and 97 additional observers for the Skopje-based NGO “Wake Up.”

The SEC members decided to provide advance payments of Mden 8,000 per route to employees handling the transport of confidential election materials for biometric ID devices.

A total of nine complaints regarding personal voting rights were submitted to the State Election Commission (SEC). After reviewing them, the SEC members decided to reject three complaints as unfounded and accepted six.

Photo: Screenshot from video