“So far the meetings were held with the leadership of the Democratic and Social-Democratic parties. Today, we will appeal to the Adalat and Liberal parties,” Vahid Nazarov, a member of the initiative group and deputy chairman of the Liberal and Democratic Party of Azerbaijan (LDPA), said to Trend News. The parliamentary elections in Azerbaijan had been held on the mixed system – majority and proportional, to 2002. The proportional election system was cancelled and replaced by the majority election system by a referendum held in 2002.
In November, the opposition LDPA created an initiative group to restore the proportional system. Group unites 55 members. Group proposes other parties to join the campaign to collect signatures in order to restore the proportional election system. If the initiative to be supported, 600,000 signatures will be collected and submitted to the Central Elections Commission (CEC). After approval of signatures CEC will present the document to the Parliament.
Several MPs, which represent the governing New Azerbaijan parliament, also support the initiative to restore the proportional election system.
According to Nazarov, leaders of parties, to which they appealed, took a positive view on his initiative and will consider the issue within a week and will respond.
“If the proportional election system will not be restored, then it will be impossible to form a political system in Azerbaijan,” Araz Alizade, the co-chairman of the Social and Democratic Party of Azerbaijan (SDPA), said to Trend News.
Political parties, which want see the development of the country, must combine regardless of who put forward the initiative, Alizade said.
“We were the first who put forward the initiative to restore the proportional election system,” Ilyas Ismaylov, the chairman of the Adalat party, told Trend News.
There are peoples, who appropriated economy and eager to appropriate the political forces. “The proportional election system may prevent this. It is much easier to win in the majority election system. Each party in the proportional system is responsible for its own list only,” Ismaylov said.
Ismaylov did not exclude the possible support of the initiative.