VI. Nomination procedures
A. Registration of candidates in the Tirana municipality
Registration of candidates for parliamentary elections is done by the CEC, while for local elections it is the task of CEAZs (Article 67). The system of mid-level election commissions is peculiar in that the geographical territory covered by a CEAZ does not correspond with a constituency. The 11 CEAZs of Tirana constitute an exception for local elections since each of them covers one Tirana borough (Article 27.4).18 The Code does not specify which election administration body is competent for the registration of candidates for the Tirana municipality. In the 2011 local elections, the CEC decided to register these candidates itself. The decision of the CEC to act as the CEAZ for the Tirana municipality went beyond registration of candidates and eventually led to disputes and appeals during the stage of aggregation of results, even though at the time it provided the means to overcome this gap in the legislation in order to register candidates in Tirana. In particular, the CEC, instead of proceeding with the tabulation of results for the municipality of Tirana provided by the CEAZs, decided to open ballot boxes to search and attribute “miscast” ballots (see below in Counting and Tabulation of Results), claiming that it did so assuming the functions of the CEAZ of Tirana.
