Referendum on coal-mining limits invalid over low turnout

Referendum on coal-mining limits invalid over low turnout

The referendum on the observance of environmental limits for coal mining to guarantee the landscape protection in the Litvinov vicinity is invalid as only 38 percent of eligible voters took part in it on Friday while at lest 50-percent turnout is required by the law, the Litvinov website has informed.

The total of 95 percent of voters who participated in the referendum supported the preservation of the current limits that the government approved in 1991 in order to protect municipalities in north Bohemia against the negative impact of extensive coal mining.

The low turnout in the referendum may have been caused by the fact that people were tired of voting this year when several elections took place in the Czech Republic – to the Chamber of Deputies in June and to one third of the Senate and to local authorities in October, Jana Dolezalova from Koreny (Roots) civic association, which has submitted the proposal for the referendum, told CTK.

The campaign of the Mostecke uhelna coal-mining company could have discouraged a number of people, too, she added.

If the mining limits were lifted, the villages of Horni Jiretin and Cernice close to Litvinov would be pulled down over the mining and the opencast mine would considerably approach to Litvinov.

Some Litvinov inhabitants told CTK that the referendum was only an unnecessary waste of money as its result would not be binding.

Litvinov assemblyman Jan Slaby (Social Democrats, CSSD) expressed the same opinion, pointing to the coalition agreement of political parties in the municipal assembly, which binds the representatives to do the utmost to prevent the abolition of coal-mining limits regardless of the referendum result.

Mostecka uhelna (MUS) is prepared to mine coal above the limits on the basis of the law on mining and energy concept approved by the CSSD-led government in 2004.

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