The electoral process of December 28, 2025, was accompanied by numerous developments and important institutional decisions, which have highlighted serious irregularities in the administration and counting of votes in several municipalities of Kosovo.
Immediately after election day and the publication of preliminary results, the Central Election Commission (CEC) received numerous complaints and reports regarding irregularities during the vote counting, particularly at the level of votes of candidates within political entities.
But what happened?
Initially, the CEC decided to conduct a full recount of votes in 10 municipalities, with the aim of verifying the accuracy of the results and addressing the doubts raised.
This decision was made after identifying discrepancies between the reported results and election materials.
However, during this process, cases of suspected vote theft and manipulation within political entities have been identified, where votes are suspected of being transferred from one candidate to another.
As a result, the CEC made a new and more comprehensive decision, ordering that all 28 municipalities in the country undergo a full recount of votes, in order to guarantee the transparency and credibility of the final results.
Also, the Central Election Commission has decided that the members of political entities in the Municipal Election Commission (MEC) in the municipality of Prizren be dismissed from office, due to suspected responsibility for the irregularities found.
The CEC has warned that it will cooperate closely with the justice authorities to fully investigate the cases and punish those responsible.
What do experts in the field say?
Regarding this situation, political analyst Mazllum Baraliu estimates that this process has highlighted serious defects in the electoral system.
"The preliminary process had defects in the system of calculating and publishing preliminary results, which caused surprise, anticipation and dissatisfaction both in the public and in political parties. The recount process is highlighting serious defects that were allowed to occur, such as the case of Prizren, but also in other municipalities," Baraliu declared.
According to him, the decision for a total recount is delaying the announcement and certification of the final results, directly affecting the respect of constitutional deadlines.
"We are in a time crunch for the constitution of the Assembly, the formation of the Government, the election of the president and the approval of the budget. Therefore, the CEC must engage additional capacities, working in three shifts, 24 hours a day, so that the process does not drag on," he emphasized, writes Telegraph.
Meanwhile, Eugen Cakolli from the Kosovo Democratic Institute (KDI), in a statement to Telegrafi, described this electoral process as a "two-faced" process.
"First, we have an extremely positive image of the organization and administration of voting on election day, the transparency of the CEC and the speed in publishing preliminary results. On the other hand, we have one of the most serious violations of the electoral process after 2010, with schemes of manipulation, in some cases even industrial, of candidates' votes," Cakolli declared.
He emphasized that citizens have shown high democratic maturity, while the integrity of the elections has been violated by certain commissioners.
"This situation demonstrates the inevitable need to review the vote counting system. Moving the count to municipal centers has increased the potential for manipulation, as the intervention of one official is enough to completely distort the result," he said.
According to Cakolli, the long-term solution should be the transition to digital counting, which would reduce intervention and significantly speed up the process.
"Persons who have committed violations, manipulations or misuses should be investigated and punished as soon as possible, so that such cases are not repeated and the punishments have a preventive effect," Cakolli concluded.
Otherwise, at the Counting and Results Center, the counting of ballots is continuing according to the list of polling stations for which the CEC has decided to recount.
The Central Election Commission announces that from the beginning of this process (Tuesday, January 13, 2026, 18:00 PM) to now (Wednesday, January 21, 2026, 10:00 AM), 834 out of 2,557 polling stations have been recounted.
According to this data, so far the recount has been fully completed in 7 municipalities.
On the CEC platform for results https://resultsparliamentary2025.kqz-ks.org/, in the CNR > Recount area, the results will be displayed after the counting of each polling station. /Telegrafi/
