Cologne/Düren (dpa/lnw) - The "More Democracy NRW" initiative sees its call for postal voting documents to be automatically sent out in elections confirmed by the high level of participation in a referendum in the Düren district. The fact that more than half of those entitled to vote used their voting rights there is an above-average participation for such votes, said state manager Achim Wölfel according to a message on Friday. "The automatic sending of the voting documents certainly also makes an important contribution."
In the referendum, changing the name to "Rurkreis Düren-Jülich" was up for debate. According to the district, almost 120,000 people voted by Thursday, which corresponds to a participation of around 55 percent. With 83 percent of the votes, a large majority was in favor of keeping the name.
According to "More Democracy NRW", participation was significantly higher than the average for referendums in NRW between 1994 and 2022 (31.6 percent). In votes in 2020 in Bonn for the Melbbad, 2021 in Bad Münstereifel for wind turbines and 2022 in Wuppertal for the Federal Garden Show - each postal vote, but without automatically sent voting documents - the participation was between 35.5 and 44.6 percent.
The municipalities can decide in their statutes whether a referendum is to be carried out as a letter or ballot vote and how it is to be structured. In principle, participation in elections and votes should be as easy as possible for the population, demanded "More Democracy NRW".
