Home > 1.1.1.4 Restrictions to the right to vote > AUSTRIA - Extracts of the Costitution
 
 
 
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Article 117
 

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(2) The municipal council is elected on the basis of proportional representation by equal, direct, personal and secret suffrage by the male and female Federal nationals who have their principal domicile in the municipality. The election regulations laws can however stipulate that also nationals who have a domicile, but not their principal domicile, in the municipality, are entitled to vote. In the electoral regulations the conditions for suffrage and electoral eligibility may not be more restrictive than in the electoral regulations for the Diet; the provision can however be made that individuals who have not yet been a year resident in the municipality shall not be entitled to vote or to stand for election to the municipal council if their residence in the municipality is manifestly temporary. Among the conditions to be laid down by the election regulation is the entitlement to suffrage and electoral eligibility also for nationals of other European member states. The electoral regulation can provide that the voters exercise their suffrage in self- contained constituencies. . A division of the electorate into other electoral bodies is not admissible. Article 26 para 6 is to be applied accordingly. The electoral regulations can, in cases where no election proposals are brought forward, decree that individuals shall be deemed elected whose names appear most frequently on the ballot papers.


… (6) The mayor shall be elected by the municipal council. Land constitution can however stipulate that the mayor shall be elected by those with municipal council suffrage. In this case Article 26 para 6 is to be applied accordingly.



(7) The business of the municipalities will be performed by the local administrative office (city administrative office), that of towns with their own charter by the City administration. A civil servant with legal training shall be appointed to take charge as city administration's chief executive of the City administration's internal services.