A EuroNews broadcast before Italy’s recent parliamentary elections said that voters were being asked to enter polling stations without their mobile phones. Being politically correct, EuroNews simply said that this was a way for authorities to prevent people from taking pictures of their ballots.
If taken, EuroNews said, the pictures would serve as proof of voters’ political affiliation and would possibly bring them political gains. The story did not say who would provide the gains.
A day later, on April 14, a story published on news.scotsman.com said that there had been past cases where the Mafia had paid voters 50 euro if they took a photo of their ballot paper to prove for whom they had ticked an “X”.
At Italy’s April 13 and 14 elections, those caught with a phone faced a fine of up to 1000 euro or six months in prison, the story said. There were some arrests made of people caught having a mobile phone on them while voting.
The author, Nick Pisa, even quoted Italy’s interior ministry, who said: “We take very seriously reports that people have been offered money in exchange for proving who they voted for.”
Just five months earlier, I personally recall hearing a similar message issued by Bulgaria’s now-former interior minister Roumen Petkov. He was referring to the numerous media reports of people being offered 50 leva (25 euro) in exchange for their vote at the 2007 municipal elections. Petkov even increased the police presence in an attempt to chase away vote-buyers. Unfortunately, what viewers saw on election day was reporters chasing down black 4x4s, whose drivers did not want to say what the hell were they doing in remote villages, going door-to-door and giving residents free lifts to the polling stations and back.
To make things even more grotesque, some of those residents were quite happy to direct reporters to the nearest swanky SUV, where one could get 50 leva for his vote. Unfortunately, Bulgaria does not have Italy’s long history and tradition (61 governments in the past 63 years) and no one was arrested, despite the increased police presence.
There was one gleam of hope, however. It came in the shape of veteran politician Ahmed Dogan, whose party Movement for Rights and Freedoms has been in a position of power since 2001. At a news conference on the night of the 2007 elections, Dogan tried to ease the pain of Prime Minister Sergei Stanishev and President Georgi Purvanov, who both saw in vote buying a threat to Bulgaria’s democratic foundations and society.
Something along the lines of: “Cheer up, guys, this happens all over the world and it’s nothing to be worried about. Don’t make a big fuss of it.” Well, he did not exactly put it this way, but that was how it sounded to me. What Dogan said, with an air of a father to his young and inexperienced children, was that “buying of votes is a European norm and democracy will continue to exist with or without it”. It was well said and no one had a ready answer. After all, who could argue with someone whose party has managed to win in every election in Bulgaria for the past eight years and counting?
From what EuroNews said, it seemed that Dogan was once again right: buying votes is not limited to Bulgaria. I don’t know whether we should be happy that it is “not only our thing” or that at least the rate in Bulgaria is 25 euro, unlike Argentina, where people are paid in boxes full of food. I am not even going to mention Zimbabwe, where Robert Mugabe is not only accused of buying votes but also of not counting them at all. At least when it comes to counting ballots, Bulgaria no reason to complain. Despite our several hundred thousands polling stations, we have had just a few results contested in court.
