ELECTION OF THE PRAISIDÏEU: Nominations open

[Miestră Schivă, UrN]

Esteemed members of the General Assembly of the Free Province of Fiova:

This is going to be long, so bear with me.

According to the Constitution of our Province as just adopted, elections for a three-person Praisidïeu (standing committee of the General Assembly) will be held at the same time as every Cosa election. That is, if I understand the national electoral calendar correctly, this election will run from May 15 to June 1 this year, i.e. starting in 10 days.

Under our new Elections and Referendums Law, Title I Section 3, as Secretary of State I am required to submit to the General Assembly the rules by which I will carry out this election.

Therefore, I hereby declare that the rules for the upcoming election of the Praisidïeu will be as follows:

1. Nominations for the Praisidïeu (Title III Sections 1-2) open immediately and will close 1 week from now.

Under Title III Section 2.1, such a nomination includes the candidate's full name; their party affiliation (if any); and a statement, no longer than fifty words, of the candidate's aims and objectives (optional).

Please make these nominations in this thread, or by personal communication with myself, no latter than seven days from the date of posting of this message!

2. The period between close of nominations and start of voting (Title III Section 4) will therefore be only 3 days, as determined by the Chancery's timetable for the national elections.

3. the actual process of voting and the production of the "ballot paper" (Title II Section 2) will be delegated to the National Chancery, whom I have asked to use the same voting mechanism as used for Senäts elections. This will allow "write-in" candidates (Title III, Section 5.3.1): the voters may give any citizen, not just the officially nominated candidates, a preference.

4. Once the Chancery reports all the votes, I will count them using the OpaVote website using "Northern Ireland STV" rules. I certify that this will provide a result as close as makes no difference to that set out in our law. (Title V, Section 12).

Questions? Comments?

[GV]

I nominate myself.

50-word statement: Gödefrïeu Válcadác'h for Praisidïeu!  Long-time Talossan - let's get our province moving again.

[Miestră Schivă, UrN]

Got a 50 word statement for the people?

[Miestră Schivă, UrN]

I am going to stand as a candidate for the Praisidïeu, as I am entitled to seeing as there has been only 1 other nomination.

Our new Elections and Referendums Law states as follows (Title III, section 4.2):

the Secretary of State wishes to declare themselves a candidate for the election, then they shall either -

    appoint one or more Deputies as provided in Title I.2, and shall delegate all their functions under this Act for the remainder of that election to such Deputies; or:
    make a report to the Praisidïeu and the General Assembly explaining why it is in the best interests of Fiova for them to be a candidate, and explain the steps that they will take to maintain confidence in the fairness of the election.
        The Praisidïeu or the General Assembly shall be entitled to reject this report and thereby disqualify the Secretary of State from being a candidate, and/or receiving any "write-in" votes, at any time before balloting day.

My report is as follows:

1) it is in the best interests of Fiova for there to be at least two people who take responsibility for the future of the province, if we don't want the last 3 years of apathy and nothing to continue.
2) since the actual voting will be entirely conducted by the Chancery, and the counting conducted by an automatic system, I don't see that there is much I could do to "rig" the election. Nevertheless, if anyone objects to this before Balloting Day, I will withdraw my name from official consideration.

My 50 word statement is as follows:

Since I'm just taking up space on the ballot, I'm going to fill up the rest of my 50 words with the names of Blue Öyster Cult songs. Imaginos, Don't Fear The Reaper, Godzilla, Dominance and Submission, Veteran of the Psychic Wars, Florida Man, Great Sun Jester, Career of Evil...

[Miestră Schivă, UrN]

Nominations will remain open until whatever deadline the Chancery imposes for preparing the ballot. Nominations have closed to save work for the Chancery.

[GV]

Got a 50 word statement for the people?

Belatedly, yes: I will work for a better Fiôvâ - one which truly wants to be active and one which makes Talossa even greater than it already is.