Presidential candidates whose candidacy has been confirmed will receive money from the state budget to finance their campaign, even if irregularities are found in the documentation, said Milos Vukanovic, political campaign financing analyst at the Centre for Monitoring and Research (CeMI).

Complaints about possible falsified signatures of support for several candidates for the President of Montenegro appeared in the media, on social networks and in the State Election Commission (SEC). The Basic State Prosecutor's Office in Podgorica announced that they will deal with the matter and possibly prosecute those responsible.

Vukanovic clarified that, if the presidential candidate's candidacy is confirmed, he is included in the group of candidates who will share 20 percent of the total estimated budget funds.

"The estimated budget funds for the presidential elections this year are 880,000 euros. Of that amount, 20 percent, about 160,000 euros, is guaranteed and is divided among the seven candidates whose candidacy has been confirmed. As for the other 80 percent of funds, that amount is shared by all candidates who exceed the election result by more than three percent," Vukanovic said in a statement to the PR Center.

As he pointed out, this applies only in the case of the first round.

"If there is a second round of elections, the candidates who pass three percent share 40 percent of the amount, while the candidates who passed to the second round share the remaining 40 percent of the amount." There are no legal norms that provide for a presidential candidate who does not exceed three percent of the census to return the allocated funds. In this case, it is about 25 thousand euros," said Vukanovic.

He said that citizens must be aware that elections are the basic process of democracy in a society, and that all aspects of the electoral process are flawed - laws, election administration and voter lists.

"As for the laws themselves, the Law on the Election of Councilors and Members of Parliament and the Law on the Election of the President are vague, with the fact that the Law on the Election of the President is additionally vague, because all ambiguities that are not defined by that Law indicate that they should be resolved by the insufficiently clear Law on election of councilors and deputies", said Vukanovic.

He assessed that these two laws have a lot of illogic, that they are incomplete and that they complicate the democratic process in Montenegro, "but also prevent the work of state institutions and the civil sector from clearly controlling the spending of money in the election campaign."

"An additional illogicality is that the state institutions that are supposed to be the control mechanism can essentially only react to what is delivered to them. This means that they respond to legal behavior, not illegal behavior. So it is very important that citizens react and report irregularities at all times," said Vukanovic.

He called on citizens to have greater initiative to report irregularities and violations of voting rights, as this represents an additional weapon for the civil sector for timely reactions and ensuring a greater degree of integrity of the electoral process.