Statistical Yearbook of the Czech Republic

      The ballot papers were delivered and checked and the votes were first polled at standing election wards where respective election committees were common to both the Senate and local elections. The local elections took place at a total of 14 702 election wards of which 5 119 were also used for the Senate elections at the same time. The elections were held on the territory of the Czech Republic only and were steered by the Central Electoral Committee as the standing electoral body. Act No. 247/1995 Coll., on Election to Parliament of the CR, as last amended, and Act No. 491/2001 Coll., on Elections to Local Councils, as last amended, newly regulated the competence of the individual electoral bodies, entrusting all organizational and technical preparations of the elections and the processing of election results as an execution of state administration to government and self-government bodies, except for the tasks of ward election committees.

      The local elections were held on the basis of universal, equal and direct suffrage by secret ballot. The right to vote was enjoyed by Czech nationals aged 18+ on the election day, who were residing in the municipality concerned and were not hindered by law to exercise their suffrage. The voter was allowed to cast his/her vote only at the election ward of his/her residence and his/her name could not be on more than one list of electors. The number of local council members was dependent on the population of municipality and ranged between 5 and 55 except for the capital city of Prague where the upper limit was set to 70. The voter was free to use one of three ways of casting his/her vote stipulated by the law using the ballot common to all parties standing for elections. The pre-determined number of seats in local council was split among the election parties in one scrutiny, using a proportional system and election aliquots.

Table 28-1 gives a general survey on the number of elected local councils, voters on the list of electors and the turnout by district and region.

Table 28-2 lists total election returns by individual political parties and movements, which put up their candidates, as well as those for independent candidates. The figures on the number of votes show that each voter participating in the elections had a maximum of so many votes that corresponded to the number of members elected to the local council. Therefore, the number of the seats does not have to be directly proportional to the number of the votes, because a substantially smaller number of votes was necessary in smaller municipalities than in larger ones (as measured by population) to get a seat.

      The tables do not include results of elections to councils of city parts and city districts of territorially broken-down statutory cities and towns or the city parts of the capital city of Prague.

      The elections to the Senate of Parliament of the Czech Republic were held on the basis of universal, equal and direct suffrage by secret ballot according to the principle of the first-past-the-post system of voting in single-mandate election districts. The districts were stipulated by the annex to the Election Act so that each would cover a territory with a population of 127 thousand on average. Compared to 1996, the definition of the election wards No. 27 in the capital city of Prague was changed. The right to vote was enjoyed by Czech nationals aged 18+ on the second polling day, who were not hindered by law to exercise their suffrage. The voter was allowed to exercise his/her suffrage only in his/her election ward of residence where his/her name was on the standing or special list of electors. Czech citizens who were not residing on the territory of the CR and made their appearance in a polling station on the polling days were also allowed to vote. No voter's name was allowed to be on more than one list of electors. The "one voter - one vote" principle was ensured by the organisational measure: the election committee gave the voter an official envelope for him/her to cast his/her vote by inserting into it the ballot paper of the candidate chosen.

      If a candidate won over 50% of total votes valid in the election district, he/she was returned a member of the Senate. Where none of the candidates achieved this limit, no senator was elected and the second round was held in the election ward concerned six days later. However, only the first two candidates who got the most valid votes in the first round qualified to the second. Only one senator (election ward No. 54 of Znojmo) was elected in the first round on 25-26 October 2002 and thus the second round of the elections was run in the remaining 26 election districts on 1-2 November 2002, in parallel to local elections. Table 28-3 gives basic figures on the number of voters and election turnout, while Table 28-4 provides total election results by political party, political movement and/or coalitions thereof which ran their candidates to senators. Included are also results for independent candidates for both rounds.

Table 28-5 gives a list of the senators elected.

      The sum of the relative values does not have to be equal to 100 due to rounding off.