The National Election Committee, acting within its competence laid down in Section 90/A (4) a), Section 99/K (5) a), Section 105/A (4) a), Section 115/I (8) a), and Section 115/P (5) a) of Act C of 1997 on the electoral procedure (hereinafter: Ve.), issues the following

resolution

on the delegation to election committees:

Ve. Section 3 states: "When applying the rules of the electoral procedure, the participants involved in the election must enforce the following fundamental principles:

(...)

c) equal opportunities between candidates and nominating organizations."

Based on Ve. Section 21 (2)

"Election committees:

a) the ballot-counting committee,

b) the local election committee,

c) the parliamentary constituency election committee,

d) the territorial election committee,

e) the National Election Committee."

According to Ve. Section 25 (1), "In addition to those mentioned in Section 23, one further member of each election committee shall be delegated by a nominating organization that has a candidate or list in the constituency, or by an independent candidate."

Based on Ve. Section 28 (4): "The rights and obligations of elected and delegated members are the same, with the exception that delegated members are not entitled to an honorarium."

Ve. Section 49 (2) states: "If several nominating organizations jointly nominate a candidate, they shall be considered as one nominating organization for the purposes of the election."

Based on the provisions of the Act on the electoral procedure, a given election committee performs tasks related to several types of elections at the same time (e.g., during local government elections, the local election committee's scope of duties includes the individual list election and the mayoral election, in settlements with more than 10,000 inhabitants, the individual constituency election and the mayoral election, etc.)

The National Election Committee's position is that in these election committees, equal opportunities must be ensured between candidates and nominating organizations by applying Ve. Section 25 (1). This provision of the Ve. is because the purpose of delegation to election committees is to ensure the representation of candidates and nominating organizations in the decisions made during the electoral procedure.

The enforcement of the principle of equal opportunities between candidates and nominating organizations is therefore ensured by an interpretation of Ve. Section 25 (1) according to which a nominating organization or an independent candidate may delegate one member per election committee, regardless of how many types of elections they have a candidate (list) in. Consequently, the delegated member, also in consideration of Ve. Section 28 (4), may participate in decisions related to all types of elections. An opposing interpretation, where a nominating organization or an independent candidate has multiple delegated members participating in decision-making, would give that nominating organization or independent candidate an unjustified advantage over those nominating organizations and independent candidates who could only delegate one member to the election committee based on a nomination in one type of election.

Regarding election committees delegated after joint candidates (lists), the National Election Committee already stated in its Resolution 1/2002. (II. 1.) OVB that "nominating organizations (parties) that jointly nominate a candidate or list are entitled to delegate one member to the election committees as one nominating organization."

Dr. Péter Szigeti
President of the National Election Committee

* Its text was established by Resolution 5/2010. OVB