Procedure for holding elections and referendums changed in Uzbekistan

Amendments and additions have been made to some legislative acts aimed at further improving the procedure for holding elections and referendums.

In particular, in accordance with the amendments and additions to the Electoral Code:

- to conduct elections of deputies to the Legislative Chamber, 75 territorial single-mandate electoral districts are formed;

- for holding elections to the Legislative Chamber on the basis of a list of candidates nominated by political parties for deputies of the Legislative Chamber, the entire territory of Uzbekistan is a single electoral district;

- after registering the list, the parties included in this list acquire the status of candidate for deputy and are issued certificates;

- candidates included in the party list may be members of a given political party or non-party members. Members of other political parties cannot be included in this list;

- the number of women must be at least 40% of the number of candidates for deputy nominated by a political party in single-mandate electoral districts, as well as on the basis of the party list (previously up to 30%). At the same time, at least two out of five candidates in sequence on the party list must be women.

It is also stipulated that the Central Election Commission is formed by the chambers of Oliy Majlis consisting of 9 members and operates on a permanent basis (previously, there were 15). One member of the Central Election Commission is a representative of Karakalpakstan.

It is also determined that elections to local councils are held in territorial single-mandate electoral districts on a multi-party basis for a period of 5 years.

The number of deputy seats in the regional and Tashkent city councils of people’s deputies is determined based on the population as follows:

• in areas with population:

- up to 2 million people – from 30 to 40;

- from 2 to 3 million people – from 40 to 50;

- more than 3 million people – from 40 to 50.

The number of deputy seats in district and city councils of people’s deputies is determined based on population size as follows:

• in areas with population:

- up to 30 thousand people – from 10 to 15;

- from 30 to 100 thousand people – from 15 to 20;

- from 100 to 300 thousand people – from 20 to 25;

- more than 300 thousand people – from 25 to 30.

The seats of deputies of the Legislative Chamber, elected in a single electoral district, are distributed among political parties that received 7% or more of the votes of voters who took part in these elections.

If only one political party received 7% or more of the votes of voters who took part in the elections, then deputy seats will also be distributed to the second political party that received the largest number of votes in the elections.

The distribution of deputy mandates among deputies elected on the party list is carried out in accordance with the order of deputy candidates included in the party list registered by the Central Election Commission.

In addition, according to the changes, at least 5 deputies of the Legislative Chamber have the right to form a faction (previously, their number was 9).