When you can't vote neither by post nor in person

The postal vote has achieved in these elections record participation figures and has increased by 350% largely due to the pandemic. The vast majority of voters who requested it have been able to vote by mail. This is not the case, however, of Sílvia Barceló, a Barcelona resident who was not allowed to do so this Sunday. Barceló requested the vote by mail last February 2nd but the documentation never arrived to its destination. "I didn't receive any notification or anything", she explains in conversation with ARA.

This Sunday at noon she went in person to his polling station, the school of the Concepció, in the Eixample district of Barcelona, where she was confirmed that she was on the lists of voters by mail and not in the one of the voters in person. "I have called the Electoral Census Office and the Electoral Board and they have told me that the only thing I can do is to make a complaint to the Post Office but that there was no solution and I could not vote", Barceló explains, who considers that her right to vote "has been violated". "Obviously, I am very angry", she adds. Once the postal vote application has been made at the electoral roll office, it is no longer possible to vote in person at the polling station on election day. The table where she would have had to vote has opened an incident with her case.

The postal vote was the alternative to vote without having to go to the polling station. The vote could be delivered to a post office up to two days before the elections or to the postman when he took the necessary documentation - the ballots and the envelope - to the applicant's home, which in the case of Sílvia Barceló never arrived. The Electoral Census Office has informed her that her documents have been sent within the established deadline and delivered by the Post Office. "But they have not delivered anything to me", says Barceló, who had opted for postal voting to avoid crowds in a context of pandemic as the current one. In addition, she is the mother of a four-year-old daughter and wanted to avoid having to go to the polling station with her.