Montenegrin Independence Referendum, 2006 - Referendum Rules Controversies

Referendum Rules Controversies

There has been considerable controversy over suffrage and needed result threshold for independence. The Montenegrin government, which supported the independence, initially advocated a simple majority, but the opposition insisted on a certain threshold below which the referendum, if a "yes" option won, would have been moot.

Milo Đukanović, Prime Minister of Montenegro, promised that he would declare the independence if the votes passed 50%, regardless of whether the census was passed or not. On the other hand, he also announced that if less than 50% voted for the independence option, he would resign from all political positions. The original pursuit of Milo Đukanović and the DPS-SDP was that 40% voting in favour of statehood be a sufficient percentage to declare independence, but this caused severe international outrage before the Independentists proposed 50%.

Another controversial issue was the referendum law, based on the constitution of Serbia and Montenegro, which stated that Montenegrins living within Serbia registered to vote within Serbia should be prohibited from voting in the referendum because that would give them two votes in the union and make them superior to other citizens.