Rules for Collecting Signatures in Support of Candidates.
Regardless of their form of property, the state bodies, municipalities and legal entities shall be prohibited from participating in collection of signatures. It shall be prohibited to make voters sign the signature sheet, to prevent them to sign or to pay any kind of rewards to them during signature collecting processes. If non observance of this prohibition is approved by a relevant court, it can be the basis for considering the collected signatures invalid, and for refusal from registration of the candidates and the registered candidates.:
A citizen of the Republic of Azerbaijan who is 18 years old and has active suffrage can collect voters’ signatures. A candidate, political party and block of political parties can sign an agreement on collecting signatures with a person who shall collect voters’ signatures. Payment for this job can be paid only from the election fund of a candidate, political party and block of political parties.
Signatures in support of candidates can be collected in educational institutions, residential areas as well as other places, which are not prohibited to conduct election campaign by the law.
A voter shall record the following information upon signing the signature sheet:
name, surname, patronymic, date of birth;
address of residence;
serial and batch number and date of issue of the identification or substitute document;
date of signing the signature sheet.
Information about the voters required to be recorded can be recorded on the signature sheets by a person who collects signatures. Information mentioned above shall be recorded in hand and their non-dissemination be ensured.
Signature sheets shall be prepared in accordance with Appendices # 1,2,3 to this Code.
While collecting voters’ signatures in support of a candidate, the signatures can be recorded on front or reverse side of signature sheets. In such cases, the reverse side of the signature sheets shall be considered a continuation of the front page and verifying signatures are recorded on the reverse side.
A signature sheet shall be signed by a person who collected the signatures and by a candidate after collection of signatures has been completed. Before signing the signature sheet, a person who collected them shall record the following information about him/her:
surname, name, patronymic;
address of residence;
serial and batch number of identification or substitute document;
date of issue.
If the candidate is nominated by a political party or block of political parties, the signature sheet shall be signed by a person who collected signatures and by an authorized representative of a political party, block of political parties after collection of signatures has been completed. Before signing the signature sheet, a person who collected them shall record the following information about him/herself:
surname, name, patronymic;
address of residence;
serial and batch number of identification or substitute document;
date of issue.
The relevant authorized representative shall record his/her surname, name, patronymic and date of signing.
After a political party, block of political parties and initiative group of voters, which has nominated a candidate, informs the relevant election commission about nomination of the same candidate in writing, they can collect necessary number of signatures in support of the candidate together. In such cases, it shall be allowed to integrate the voters’ signatures in support of the candidates collected by different person.
Initiators of the nomination of a candidate, authorized representatives of a candidate, political party or block of political parties shall count the number of voters’ signatures collected in support of the nominee, draw up and sign the protocol on results of collection of voters’ signatures.
Signature sheets submitted to relevant election commissions should be numbered and paged in the form of a folder.
