VUKOVAR, March 11 (Hina) - Transitional Administrator General Jacques Klein told Tuesday's news conference in Vukovar's UNTAES base that elections in the Croatian Danubian area would take place on 13 April. Elections for municipal and
town councils would be organized by a joint implementation committee and would be implemented by local electoral committees, Klein said. The same electoral bodies will implement elections for the Osijek and Vukovar counties' county assemblies and for the Croatian Parliament House of Counties, simultaneously with elections for municipal and town councils.
VUKOVAR, March 11 (Hina) - Transitional Administrator General
Jacques Klein told Tuesday's news conference in Vukovar's UNTAES
base that elections in the Croatian Danubian area would take place
on 13 April. Elections for municipal and town councils would be
organized by a joint implementation committee and would be
implemented by local electoral committees, Klein said.
The same electoral bodies will implement elections for the
Osijek and Vukovar counties' county assemblies and for the Croatian
Parliament House of Counties, simultaneously with elections for
municipal and town councils. #L#
Candidates may be entered in the elections starting Wednesday.
The deadline for candidates for the local government and self-
government representation bodies expires in 12 days and for the
Parliament House of Counties in 14 days. The Committee for voters'
lists is to notarize the lists of voters eight days before the
elections.
Onofre Dos Santos, UNTAES election officer, said that General
Klein had announced changes in municipal boundaries, forming new
municipalities in the UNTAES-administered area. Thus the village of
Negoslavci would become one municipality, the villages of Ostrovo,
Gabos, Karadzicevo, Markusica and Podrinje would form a
municipality with the seat in Markusica, the villages of Sodolovci,
Koprivna, Petrova Slatina, Paulin Dvor, Ada, Palaca and Silas would
be formed into a municipality with the seat in Sodolovci, and the
villages of Majske Medje, Bolman, Novi Bolman, Jagodnjak and Novi
Ceminac would form a municipality with the seat in Jagodnjak. Tenja
and Mirkovci would become "transitional municipalities" which would
cease to exist a year after the elections and would begin to
function as local administrative offices, Dos Santon said.
Croatian Administration Minister Davorin Mlakar said that the
decision about calling the elections was the result of several
months of work and negotiations between both sides and UNTAES. The
joint committee passed rules which we would abide by, Mlakar said.
A Serb member of the implementation committee for the
elections, Milos Vojnovic, stressed that the "process started with
signing the Erdut Agreement is entering a new phase as of today,"
and that it remained to be seen whether the elections would only be
a formal act or would they change the situation from the root.
Speaking further about the forthcoming elections, Klein said
that at the moment, out of the 84,000 applications for Croatian
citizenship certificates, 68,000 had been processed and 54,000
identification cards had been issued.
There were still a large number of people in the area who had
not picked up their documents, Klein said, adding that 37% of the
residents now had the necessary documents.
He called on the residents of the area to take their Croatian
documents and thus realize their right to vote.
Asked what the changes in municipal borders meant, Mlakar said
that the Transitional Administrator, in line with international
documents, had the right to set different municipal boundaries than
as had been set by Croatian law.
Mlakar added that the changes would not influence the results
of the elections too much.
Klein called on Croatian and Serb reporters to cooperate
during the upcoming elections, expressing conviction that the
elections would be democratic and open.
(hina) lm mm
111742 MET mar 97