Fifth: Election Rules
Article (27):
Election shall be held by direct secret ballot.
Article (28):
The Election Management Committee shall form voting centre committees as deemed suitable for conducting the electoral process and appoint a person in charge of the voting centre in each emirate. These committees shall implement the electoral process within the time schedule allocated for the emirate.
Article (29):
Voting shall start at 8am on the day fixed for the elections in each emirate.
If voting at the centre is conducted manually, the ballot box (es) shall be opened and closed by the voting centre officials before the voters and candidates present or their representatives in a bid to ensure that they are empty before they are sealed by the committee's seal and that the ballots submitted by the Election Management Committee to the voting centre committee are counted.
However, in case an electronic system is used, the voting centre official shall ensure that the approved technical and organizational procedures are available in this system in cooperation with an information system expert.
In all cases, a report to this effect signed by the centre official and members shall be written. Voting shall continue till 7pm the same day.
Voting shall extend beyond 7pm if voters in the election hall are found to have not cast their ballots and shall continue until all of them have voted. Subsequently, the person in charge of the voting centre committee shall announce that the electoral process is over.
Article (30):
The voter's identity shall be verified through his identity card issued by the Emirates Identity Authority.
Article (31):
The voting centre committee shall take all the necessary measures to prevent a voter's repeat voting during the election day.
Article (32):
The voting centre committee shall give a ballot to each voter to cast his/her vote by marking it in the dedicated place inside the voting hall. The voter shall then put the ballot inside the ballot box in front of the voting centre official or one of the voting centre members. Neither the official nor the member shall have the right to view the content of the ballot. In case the electronic voting system is used, the methods indicated in this system shall be followed to achieve the required goal.
Article (33):
Illiterate and blind voters and other individuals with special needs who are unable to cast their votes by themselves shall do so before the person in charge of the voting centre committee and in the presence of a committee member who shall endorse the expressed opinion.
Article (34):
Keeping order in the voting hall and securing it are the responsibility of the person in charge of the voting centre committee, who shall have the right to call the police when necessary. Excluding those who come to exercise their voting rights, policemen are banned from entering the voting hall unless requested by the person in charge of the committee.
Article (35):
Voting in the election shall be regarded as complete when all the voters registered in the voting list have cast their votes before the closing time of the elections.
Article (36):
A voter may not stay in the voting hall after casting his/her ballot, and the candidate or his/her representative may attend the casting and sorting of ballots.
Article (37):
The person in charge of the voting centre committee shall decide on all the matters related to whether or not the ballot is valid. The ballot, however, shall be regarded as invalid in the following cases:
- Provisional ballot.
- Ballots in which more than the number of candidates required to be elected are marked.
- Votes marked on ballots other than the ones sealed by the voting centre committee.
- Ballots that reveal the voter's identity or makes a reference to him/her.
- No vote is cast in the ballot.
- Ballots damaged either by scratching or cutting.
Article (38):
The ballot boxes shall be sorted out to determine the number of votes and the votes shall be tabulated in a list in which the names of the candidates, the number of votes obtained by each candidate and the number of invalid ballots shall be recorded. Before being tabulated in the list, each voter's ballot shall be numbered by the person in charge of the voting centre. This process shall continue non-stop until all ballots have been sorted.
In case of e-voting, the observed technical methods shall be employed for sorting ballots.
Article (39):
The result of the winners of the elections shall be announced as per the number of seats allocated for each emirate and highest number of votes received. By-elections shall be conducted in the following cases:
- If the candidates have received the highest and equal number of votes and consequently neither has won the election because their number is larger than the number of seats allocated for each emirate.
- If some candidates have won seats, but the runners-up are equal and larger in number than the remaining vacant seats allocated for the emirate.
In all cases, if the ballots of candidates are equal in the by-elections, a draw shall be conducted among the runners-up by the person in charge of the voting centre in the presence of an NEC member to fill the seats allocated for each emirate and determine the reserve list.
Article (40):
The person in charge of the voting centre shall write a report that elections have been closed which shall include the following:
- The time the electoral process has been completed.
- The time the process of sorting ballots has been completed.
- The number of ballots (both valid and invalid) that have been sorted.
- The results reached after sorting ballots.
This report as well as the lists of data incorporating the sorting results shall be put in a separate envelope and handed over to the Election Management Committee after being sealed by the committee's seal and signed.
Article (41):
The person in charge of the voting centre committee in the emirate shall announce the number of votes each candidate has received. The reports shall be sent to the Election Management Committee for final announcement of winners in each emirate. The person in charge of the voting centre shall determine the reserve members in each emirate as per the number of votes received by each one of them. In case of equal votes, a draw shall be conducted by the person in charge of the voting centre to decide the winners.
Article (42):
The voting centre committee shall collect the ballots of each candidate after both the voting and sorting processes are over and shall put them in a box or more after taking all the necessary precautionary measures. They shall be sealed and signed by the chairman and members of the voting centre committee and handed over to the Election Management Committee to keep them until the appeal period is over. The ballots shall be destroyed only by a decision issued by the NEC.