Wednesday, June 03, 2009

How to Vote

If you are living in Spain, over 18, non-Spanish European and have asked for the right to vote (that's around 350,000 people) and were wondering how to - then this one's for you.

The European Elections are this Sunday 7th June and the polling station is nearby. If you live in Mojácar, it's at the school (up in the Campo de Fútbol behind the pueblo). Indeed, in most other villages it'll be in the school as well. In Mojácar, there are four polling stations, A - M and N - Z, 'pueblo' and 'playa' kind of thing, so check with the lists outside to be sure which room to use.

To vote, you go into your room and go behind the curtain to choose the ticket from one of the 36 different parties running in Spain and you fold one of the 'papeletas', unmarked, inside the envelope. Spain is just one constuency for the European elections, so you have the same choice of papeletas as someone in Bilbao (although, of course, the Bilbao ones will be written in two different languages, Spanish and Basque).
Take the completed vote to the table and show your (photographic) ID. Your Residents Card or passport and silly unfoldable green A4 letter from the ministry will do nicely.
Go and have a beer at the bar round the corner - Ramón's in Mojácar - and feel justifiably proud to have participated.

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