Back to manual vote counting in this year’s elections / Article

He said that he had reviewed the information provided by the European Public Prosecutor’s Office on 18th March of this year regarding possible violations in information technology procurement and their potential impact on the 2026 Saeima election process.

“Elections are the primary mechanism through which the people of Latvia exercise their sovereign rights as provided for in Article 2 of the Constitution of the Republic of Latvia. In a democratic state, state power is legitimate only if it derives from the will of the people, freely expressed in elections. Elections are free if voters can freely form their opinions and express their wishes, as well as fight against violations of electoral procedures,” said Rinkēvičs.

Last week, information provided by the European Public Prosecutor’s Office regarding possible violations in IT-related procurement within the public administration raised questions about the security of the electoral process and vote counting in this year’s Saeima elections.

“The Latvian public must be given unequivocal assurance that the 2026 Saeima elections will be conducted fairly, transparently, and securely, eliminating any doubts about the potential impact of flaws in information technology solutions on election results. Therefore, I urge the responsible authorities not to delay and to decide to conduct the vote counting for the 2026 Saeima elections manually, that is, to have election commission members count voters’ ballots by hand, rather than relying on IT systems prone to potential errors,” summarised Rinkēvičs.

The President will also propose that the National Security Council discuss the conduct of the elections, potential threats, and external influence at its meeting in April.

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