MADRID/TOLEDO, July 22 (EUROPA PRESS) –
A total of 2.47 million voters have deposited their vote at the Post Office for the general elections to be held this Sunday, July 23, which represents 94.2% of all applications admitted and a historical record. In the case of Castilla-La Mancha there have been 102,903 people.
Correos reported this Saturday the final data, which is both the highest figure since the general elections since 2008 (the first year with approved statistical records), and the highest in Spanish democracy, thus qualifying the management of postal voting as a “resounding success”.
Specifically, it represents 99.08% more than the total number of votes admitted in the general elections held on April 28, 2019 (1,241,716) and 82.06% more than those registered in the homologous process held on June 26, 2016 (1,357,745), which until now marked the historical record in the number of votes by mail managed in the electoral processes of Spanish democracy.
Correos recalls that 2,622,808 applications to vote by mail have been admitted, also a new historical record, after having made 100% of the electoral documentation available to applicants, either by hand delivery to their homes or by notifying them to be picked up at the Post Office.
For its part, the difference between applications and votes admitted stood at 5.8%, the lowest ratio recorded in all electoral processes (7.8% in April 2019; 6.6% in June 2016, and an average of 7.3% considering the general elections held since 2008). In total, 150,873 people who requested to vote by mail have not finally voted.
By Autonomous Communities, Madrid is the region with the most votes cast by mail, with a total of 592,241, followed by Andalusia (377,678), Catalonia (251,324), the Basque Country (204,815), Castilla y León (171,126), the Valencian Community (170,518), Galicia (139,068), Castilla-La Mancha (102,903), Aragon (8 8,731), Canary Islands (79,745), Extremadura (59,069).
The uniprovincial Communities, apart from Madrid, and the Autonomous Cities are distributed as follows: Asturias (53,799), Murcia (49,111), Navarra (44,908), the Balearic Islands (34,355), Cantabria (22,283), La Rioja (19,897), Ceuta (5,262) and Melilla (5,102).
LOGISTICS DEPLOYMENT
Correos defends having put “all the necessary organizational, technological, logistical and human resources” to guarantee compliance with the public service obligations entrusted to it in the electoral processes.
Specifically, it has carried out more than 21,000 reinforcement contracts, both for offices and for the delivery of shipments and the necessary tasks in logistics centers, opening offices in an extraordinary way on Saturday and Sunday, with an extension of customer service hours until 10:00 p.m. in 654 offices throughout the country, opening on local holidays and the extension of hours throughout the network, particularly in tourist areas where there has been a greater influx.
Correos has also made extraordinary distributions of electoral mailings during the weekends and deployed all the means to ensure that the votes admitted at any of its public service points throughout Spain until 2:00 p.m. yesterday, July 21, are delivered on Sunday at the corresponding polling station.
To do this, it will establish a special logistics deployment, made up of more than 14,000 professionals, including delivery personnel, offices and treatment centers, and will mobilize all the necessary vehicles in its fleet.
When the polling stations open, a first team of staff from the public postal company will deliver the votes in custody at the 60,314 polling stations distributed in the 22,562 polling stations of the 8,131 municipalities in Spain.
Another group of employees will deliver to the polling stations the votes by mail that could be received during the course of the day. Finally, another team will collect the so-called ‘third envelope’, with the final result of the scrutiny, from the polling stations of each and every one of the polling stations in the country.
CENSUS CARDS AND ELECTION ADVERTISING
Among the tasks entrusted to Correos was also the distribution of census registration cards and electoral propaganda shipments, in addition to communications to members of the polling stations, sending the census list to the Town Halls or collecting documentation on election day.
Thus, the company has distributed the 35.14 million census cards sent by the National Institute of Statistics to the homes of citizens with the right to vote on July 23, which contain the data of their registration in the census, as well as the corresponding school and polling station. In addition, it has distributed the electoral propaganda shipments of the different parties and coalitions that attend the elections.
“In short, Correos has adopted since the call for the general elections on July 23, all the necessary organizational measures to guarantee compliance with the obligations entrusted to it during the electoral processes. The public postal company has put and will continue to put all its technological, logistical and human resources to guarantee citizens the full exercise of their right to vote,” says the public company.
