Today in Haskovo, 44 of the 50 judges entitled to vote cast ballots again to choose six members of the Supreme Judicial Council from the judges' professional quota. This is shown by the council's video stream of the count.
The first vote was on Saturday, November 7. By 10:50am that day, 33% of magistrates had voted, judge Zhulieta Serafimova, chair of polling section 26 at the Haskovo Courthouse, told BTA. In all, 45 magistrates voted. Of the ballots, 44 were valid. One was void because of a specific mark across its whole surface.
Veselka Zlateva-Kozhuharova, administrative head and president of the Administrative Court in Pazardzhik, leads in the area with 25 votes.
Maria Terziyska, deputy administrative head and deputy president of the Regional Court in Varna, is second with 22 votes. Daniela Alexandrova, deputy administrative head and deputy president of the Sofia District Court, and Emilia Vasileva, a judge at the Supreme Court of Cassation, each won 21.
Nadya Pelovska-Dilkova, administrative head and president of the Regional Court in Vratsa, has 16 votes. Svetlana Kalinova, a judge at the Supreme Court of Cassation, has 15.
Five ballots name five candidates, two name four or three, and four name one. The section's election commission has three members.
Across Bulgaria, 2,275 judges can vote, and there are 21 candidates. Parliament, judges, prosecutors and investigators each have their own quotas on the council.
The chair of the election commission of the General Assembly of Judges will decide whether the vote was valid. The chair will announce the result for each candidate, and the names of the six who won seats, by 11pm.