Source: "Blic"
Misuse of minority lists
In the following few days, a dozen more criminal charges for misuse of special national minority voter lists will be submitted, Rodoljub Šabić, the Commissioner for Information of Public Importance, announced for “Blic”. Šabić warns that the instructions from the Ministry for Human and Minority Rights, which have enabled the misuse, are still in force, and that it is, therefore, possible to expect new criminal offenses.
On the national minority voter lists, which were made before the elections for the councils, especially the councils of Bosnians and Hungarians, the citizens were registered against their will and without them knowing. It was most often done by the members of certain parties, because parties stood behind the majority of national lists. Therefore, it happened that the hundreds of citizens received information about being registered on a national minority voter list without registering by themselves. The people in question were often those who did not at all align themselves with a certain national minority, but only had “minority background”.
- The first criminal complaint was filed regarding the special voter list in New Belgrade against an anonymous perpetrator for dozens of crimes of unauthorized data processing in concurrence with the crime of forgery. The Public Prosecutor’s Office and the Ministry of Internal Affairs should not have any serious problems in this case at least. Namely, acting contrary to the instructions of the Ministry for Human and Minority Rights, officials in the municipality recorded names of the submitters who brought along many forged requests for admission - said Šabić for “Blic”.
The Public Prosecutor’s Office should soon inform the public what has been specifically done regarding the criminal complaint from New Belgrade. Most people who have misused people's personal information will remain, sadly, undiscovered and will never be held accountable. The Ministry for Human and Minority Rights has given such instructions allowing everyone, without authorization and without identification, to fill out, sign and submit requests “for citizens”. When asked what he expects as a result of the investigation into misuse, Šabić says that "the state should do everything it can in order to, where possible, determine who the people who have violated civil right laws are and to hold them responsible for that”.
- I expect some indictments and some punishments. That is I expect a clear message that no one can mess with human rights and laws. The above instructions for the registration on the special voter lists, which enabled the misuse, are still in force. You still can, when you gather your data, submit a request for any special national minority voter list on behalf of someone else. In accordance with the instructions, the municipality officials are obliged to register that person – Šabić emphasizes.
Entrefilet:
Problems should not be swept under the carpet
- These kind of problems should not be swept under the carpet. Besides, our carpet has already got a hump like a camel. So, if the state does nothing, it sends a very disturbing message. One should especially bear in mind that the registration on the national minority voter lists, according to the Law on Personal Data Protection, represents the processing of "particularly sensitive data". Such data should, according to the Law, be treated in a special way, with special care and protection. The instructions on the registration on the separate voter lists obviously did not take that into consideration – warns the Commissioner for Information of Public Importance.
