Home > 1.3.2.2 Voting procedures > GERMANY - Federal Electoral Regulations
 
 
 
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Article 56
 

Voting

(1) Upon entering the polling station, the voter shall receive an official ballot paper and an official voting envelope. To this end, the Electoral Board may require the voter to show his or her voter's notice.

(2) The voter shall enter the polling booth, mark his or her ballot paper there and put it in the voting envelope there. The Electoral Board shall take care to ensure that only one voter is in a polling booth at any time and that each voter only stays there as long as necessary.

(3) The voter shall then proceed to the table of the Electoral Board and hand over his or her voter's notice. The voter must on demand produce some means of personal identification, particularly if he or she does not hand over the voter's notice.

(4) As soon as the clerk has found the name of the voter in the voters' register and the voter's eligibility to be has been ascertained, and if there are no grounds for turning the voter away pursuant to Paragraphs 6 and 7, the Electoral Officer shall permit the voter access to the ballot box. The voter shall put the voting envelope in the ballot box. The clerk shall record the casting of the vote in the voters' register. The members of the Electoral Board are not authorized, except for the purpose of ascertaining a voter's eligibility to vote, to announce personal details of the voter in such a way that these may be noted by other persons present at the polling station.

(5) The voter is bound to hand over the voting envelope to the Electoral Officer on demand for examination as to whether there are grounds for its rejection. With the consent of the voter, the Electoral Officer may the envelope in the ballot box unopened.

(6) The Electoral Board must turn away any voter who

1. is not registered in the voters' register and does not possess a polling card,

2.does not present a polling card although there is an acknowledgement of receipt in the voters' register (Article 30) unless it is ascertained that the voter is not registered in the polling card register,

3. already has an acknowledgement of voting in the voters' register (Article 58), unless the voter presents proof that he or she has not yet voted,

4. has marked his or her ballot paper or put it in the voting envelope outside the polling booth, or

5. refuses to surrender his or her ballot paper in an official voting envelope or wishes to surrender it in an official voting envelope which evidently differs from the other envelopes in a manner endangering the secrecy of the ballot or which contains a distinctly tangible object.

Any voter fulfilling the requirements stipulated in sentence 1, no. 1 who has not lodged an objection, having assumed on the basis of the notice received by him or her that he or she is registered in the voters' register, must, on being turned away, be informed, if appropriate, that he or she may apply to the local authority for a polling card until 3 p.m.

(7) If an Electoral Officer feels bound to question the eligibility to vote of a person regis-tered in the voters' register, or if any of the Electoral Board expresses doubt about permitting a voter to cast his or her vote, the Electoral Board shall decide on permission or refusal. The decision shall be minuted in the election record.

(8) If the voter makes a mistake on his or her ballot paper or accidentally renders the bal-lot paper or voting envelope unusable, or if the voter is turned away pursuant to Paragraph 6 (4) or (5) above, the voter may request a new ballot paper and, if necessary, a new voting envelope.