Austrian Parallel Count Site in Bulgaria's Vote Crashes

On May 7, Representatives of rival Bulgarian parties gathered to sign a free and fair elections deal, excluding former rulers GERB, who they feared might rig the vote. BGNES

The official site of the Austrian company SORA - Institute for Social Research and Consulting, which is doing a parallel vote count in Bulgaria's May 12 early general elections has crashed.

The suspected glitch occurred at the moment when SORA was to officially start presenting its results. It is attributed to an overload.

The site is not available for users, several Bulgarian media reported.

Earlier Sunday, SORA announced it would report the results between 10 am and midnight.

Last week, the Bulgarian Socialist Party, liberal Movement for Rights and Freedoms, nationalists Ataka, rightists Democrats for Strong Bulgaria, and new party Bulgaria for Citizens signed the official agreement for the parallel counting of the vote.

The unprecedented move, which unites traditional archrivals, was prompted by their shared fear that formerly-ruling GERB party might exercise its lasting influence on the executive, leading to a rigged vote.

The contract was concluded directly between SORA - who have experience with some 50 vote parallel counts - and the Socialists, with the fee shared among parties in proportion to their state subsidies.

The contract includes SORA preparing forecast results in the election night, conducting a parallel count based on copies of polling stations protocols, and preparing a statistical analysis of the vote, said company managing partner G?nther Ogris.

All data is to be published on the website fairelections-bulgaria.eu.

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