The National Election Committee - at its meeting held on August 25, 2010 - acting within its competence laid down in Section 115/I (8) a) of Act C of 1997 on the electoral procedure (hereinafter: Ve.), issues the following

resolution

.

Act LXII of 2010 on the amendment of laws necessary to reduce the number of minority self-government representatives reduced the number of municipal minority self-government representatives from five to four. Thus, according to Section 6 of Act CXIV of 2005 on the election of minority self-government representatives and on the amendment of certain laws concerning national and ethnic minorities (Kvjt.) - established by Section 1 (1) of Act LXII of 2010 - "The number of representatives is 4."

The reduction in the number of representatives did not affect the hitherto applied system of municipal minority elections, so the amendment resulting from the reduction in the number of seats that can be obtained was implemented in all necessary provisions of the Kvjt. Thus, according to Section 7 (3), "The election can be held if there are at least 4 candidates." According to Section 8, "A minority voter may vote for a maximum of 4 candidates." According to Section 9, "The election is invalid if fewer than 4 candidates receive a valid vote." According to Section 10 (1), "The 4 candidates who received the most votes will be representatives."

However, Act LXII of 2010, in accordance with the Kvjt., did not amend Annex 8 of the Ve., which defines the model of the ballot paper for municipal minority elections. The model still contains the information "A valid vote can be cast for a maximum of 5 candidates!"

The resolution of the contradiction between laws at the same legal source level is a task for legal practitioners - in this respect, all election bodies are considered legal practitioners.

Based on a joint, systematic interpretation of the provisions of the Kvjt. and the Ve., and in view of the fact that the Kvjt. was amended after the acceptance of the data content in the annex of the Ve., the National Election Committee is of the opinion that the legality of the municipal minority election can only be ensured if the local election committee accepts the ballot paper model serving the implementation of the rules defining the election system as laid down in the substantive law with the following information text: "A valid vote can be cast for a maximum of 4 candidates!"

Dr. Vilmos Bordás
President of the National Election Committee