The Central Election Commission in Kosovo is expected to verify the lists of signatories for the petition to remove the current mayors of the four northern municipalities with a Serbian majority.
The initiative groups of the petition from these municipalities submitted the signatures to the heads of municipal assemblies, who are responsible for this process.
According to the administrative instruction to remove a municipal leader, the petition had to be signed by 20 percent of eligible voters to initiate a voting process for their removal.
The president of the municipal assembly of North Mitrovica, Nexhat Uglanin, stated that the initiating group for this municipality submitted the signatures on Monday, and they will be handed over to the Central Election Commission for verification within the three-day deadline.
“Everything has gone great. Four thousand one hundred forty-eight signatures have been collected, which is a greater number than 20 percent. Immediately after this, we informed the Ministry of Local Government Administration and the Central Election Commission that we have received the petition from the initiating group, and as is known, we have a legal deadline of three days to submit the petition to the Central Election Commission, a duty that I will fulfill as the process bearer,” said Uglanin.
The spokesperson for the Central Election Commission, Valmir Elezi, told Voice of America in a written response that the commission has already received the list of signatures from the Zubin Potok municipality and is awaiting lists from the other three municipalities.
“In accordance with the current legislation, the list of signatures will be verified, meaning if the signatories are citizens with voting rights in the respective municipality,” he said.
The head of the European Union Office in Kosovo, Tomáš Szunyog, congratulated the Central Election Commission on Tuesday for its quick response to the requests of the initiative groups to dismiss the leaders of North Mitrovica, Zubin Potok, Leposavic, and Zvecan. He made these comments in a social media post after a meeting with the chairman of the Central Election Commission in Kosovo, Kreshnik Radoniqi, with whom, as he said, they discussed the process of withdrawing the mayors of the northern municipalities and internal preparations for the next steps in this process.
Organizing elections in the four northern municipalities is one of the three main demands that Western diplomacy has made to Kosovo to reduce tensions that erupted after Albanian mayors who emerged from the elections boycotted by the Serbs on April 23 of the previous year were sent to the offices of the northern municipalities with the support of the Police.
To permanently remove the mayor through a petition, 50 percent plus one of eligible voters must vote in favor. In case of failure, another petition cannot be organized before 12 months have passed.
