Vote count delayed on election day as Latvia's electoral commission checks voter data

A delay has emerged in Latvia's election-day process, with vote counting not yet underway even hours after polls closed at 20:00. Riga election commission member Laura Krastiņa told the LETA news agency that the holdup stems from unfinished data checks in the Electronic Online Voter Register (ETVR).

Reason for the delay

According to Krastiņa, verification of voter data is still being carried out. Only once this process is complete, and operations within the ETVR system are formally closed, will polling stations be able to move to the next step: checking whether any voters who had deposited their ballots for safekeeping earlier in the week subsequently changed their choice. Once such cases are identified, those envelopes will be separated from valid ballots, which will then be combined with the envelopes received on election day itself.

LETA observed that after voter admission ended, ballot boxes at polling stations remained unopened and counting had not started. Iveta Blaua, deputy chair of the Central Election Commission, explained that the delay is linked to the need to clarify data in numerous municipalities, which is why the ballot boxes were not yet being opened.

Commission meeting convened

In response to the situation, a meeting of the Central Election Commission was called to decide on how to proceed with starting the count. Despite polling stations formally not yet being permitted to open their ballot boxes, the commission's website had already displayed voting results from a number of polling stations abroad, as well as from one station in Jūrmala.