The Center for Democratic Transition (CDT) called on the Agency for the Protection of Personal Data and Free Access to Information (AZLP) to use the supervisory powers from the Law on the Protection of Personal Data, and proactively and timely check whether political subjects are legally collecting signatures of support election lists for parliamentary elections.
This was announced by the CDT.
"We remind you that the submission of electoral lists is possible from April 7, and that the deadline for their submission is May 16, and that political subjects are already collecting signatures of support," said Bijana Papović, from the CDT.
During the recently concluded presidential elections, the statement added, during the collection of signatures of support for candidacies, numerous cases of misuse of citizens' personal data and forgery of signatures were recorded, which the prosecution is investigating.
"This is not the first time that there has been a massive misuse of personal data of citizens in election processes, and it was precisely the inaction and passivity of the competent institutions that made it possible for abuses to be repeated without fear of sanctions," the announcement states.
In earlier abuses, the CDT claims, there must have been a violation of the provisions of the Personal Data Protection Act, because political subjects collected special categories of personal data, which can only be processed with the express consent of the person, which in a large number of cases they didn't get it. In these cases, AZLP did not do its job, i.e. it did not protect the rights of citizens and the electoral process.
"Instead of those who abuse citizens' personal data, AZLP chose to protect this data from domestic and international observers officially authorized to observe all segments of the election process," they said.
Therefore, according to them, it is extremely important that the AZLP this time checks in time whether political subjects collect signatures and other personal data with the consent of citizens to be able to use them to support electoral lists, and whether they process such data in a legal manner.
"Ignoring this phenomenon and failing to supervise obvious violations of the law can only be characterized as unconscionable work, which can have serious negative consequences for the election process," the announcement states.
The State Election Commission determined, said the CDT, that at least 4.338 signatures are needed to support the electoral list, i.e. 1000 signatures in the case of minority lists, or 300 signatures in the case of electoral lists representing a minority community with the participation of up to 2% in the total population of Montenegro.
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