Constituency for the 2019 general election - Part 1

Yesterday, the Royal Gazette contained the announcement on the number of constituencies for each province for the long-delayed first election after the coup, to be held early next year (unless delayed again). While this might look like another big step towards getting ready for the election, in real it is nothing but publishing the result of a simple algorithm on how to spread 350 MPs over 76 provinces depending on their population, to make sure that each constituency has a similar number of eligible votes. As the number of constituency-based MPs changed from 375 to 350 as well as the population numbers changed since the last election, there are many provinces which will have a different number of MPs.

But in real this is just the minor part of the preparing the constituencies, running the algorithm is something done in few seconds. The real work is the definition of the constituencies themselves, splitting the area of each province into different parts having a similar population number. Even in those cases where a province has now the same number of constituencies as in 2013, the 2013 definition might have to get modified if the population within the different parts of the province has changed and would make the electoral weight of each vote too much differing. I only hope the commission has already started with that bigger task way directly after it was set up, and not waiting till the last laws for the election were officially signed - as knowing the constituency boundaries is important to start campaigning, or simply for the parties to select the candidates fitting for each constituency.