SIX MONTHS ahead of the Parliamentary elections, the ruling party DISY yesterday resubmitted its proposal to change the voting system, a controversial plan to raise the threshold for representation in the House.
The suggestion was first tabled before the other political parties last February, but was strongly opposed by smaller parties, who would be squeezed out if the plan were implemented.
The proposal, which was resubmitted to the House Interior Committee yesterday, suggests that the threshold required by parties to secure a seat in parliament rise from the current 1.79 per cent to 3.4 per cent of the vote.
Junior government partners, the United Democrats, as well as opposition AKEL and KISOS, opposed DISY’s call to raise the threshold just six months ahead of the elections to take place in May 2001. At the last elections, the UD got 3.69 per cent of the vote, only just clear of the 3.4 per cent threshold sought by DISY.
The third largest party, DIKO, has still not decided on the matter.
Katerina Pantelidou was the only DISY deputy at the Committee meeting to agree with the opposition and the United Democrats, submitting a proposal to rule out a change to the voting system when election time is less than two years away.
“The proposal to rise the threshold now, six months ahead of the elections, is very suspicious. It seems some try to promote their own interests,” she said. But Christos Pourgourides of DISY told the Committee that in some European countries such as France, Sweden, Finland and Belgium, the decision to raise the threshold was taken just three months ahead of elections.
“There are no limits and no laws concerning the time to change the voting system,” he said.
The proposal also includes a suggestion for horizontal voting (allowing voters to cast preference votes across the party lines), the introduction of ten new deputies representing all of Cyprus, and a rise in the number of district deputies from 56 to 60.
A suggestion for horizontal voting was also tabled before the Committee by 14 deputies from across party lines.
But George Theodorou, representing the Election Services Centre of the Interior Ministry, told the Committee that the implementation of such a decision would be “destructive” for the elections.
“We do not have time to make the necessary practical adjustments, and I fear that the plan would end in disaster, something like this year’s American elections,” Theodorou said.
The Committee also discussed on ways to enable Cypriots living abroad to vote without having to fly to Cyprus.
Marios Matsakis of DIKO suggested they could vote at Cyprus’ High Commissions.
Stathis Kittis, also of DIKO, submitted a proposal to ban exit polls, saying they were used by parties to influence undecided voters.
Kittis suggested that polls should not be run in the last two weeks before voting day.
The Committee will continue its discussion on election-associated issues next Wednesday. The current system gives parties the right to appoint deputies of their choice to the House seats, depending on the ratio of votes they achieve in the parliamentary elections.
