The presentation of candidacies to the 2024 European Parliament elections

The competent Electoral Board for all the operations related to the presentation and proclamation of candidates for the European Parliament elections is the Central Electoral Board (article 220 of Organic Law 5/1985, of 19 June, on the General Electoral System).

The Secretary of the Electoral Board shall assign a consecutive number in order of presentation to each candidacy presented and this order shall be maintained in all the publications (article 46.9 of Organic Law 5/1985, of 19 June, on the General Electoral System).

Parties, federations, coalitions and groupings of voters may present candidacies for the European Parliament elections.

To do so, they need to provide proof of the signatures of 15,000 voters, or they can substitute this requirement with the signatures of 50 elected officials, be they Deputies, Senators, Spanish Members of the European Parliament, members of the Legislative Assemblies of the Autonomous Communities or Local Corporations, or mayors or district mayors. The latter requirement shall not apply to groupings of voters.

No voter or elected official may give his or her signature for the presentation of several candidacies.

Parties, federations, coalitions and groupings of voters may state, upon the presentation of their candidacies to the Central Electoral Board, the territorial scope in which they wish their ballot papers to be distributed, when it is smaller than the State and provided that it coincides with at least the existing electoral sections in an Autonomous Community (article 221.4 of Organic Law 5/1985, of 19 June, on the General Electoral System).

All citizens of the European Union of legal age who are eligible to vote and not affected by any of the grounds for disqualification provided for in articles 6 and 210 of Organic Law 5/1985, of 19 June, on the General Electoral System are eligible to stand for election.

The deadline for presenting candidacies is from 1-6 May. The presented candidacies are published in the Official State Gazette on 8 May and the proclaimed candidacies are published on 14 May (articles 47.1, 220.5 of Organic Law 5/1985, of 19 June, on the General Electoral System)

Parties and federations that enter into a coalition agreement to jointly contest an election must notify the Board within ten days of the announcement of the election (17 May to 26 April).

This notification must state the name of the coalition, the rules governing it and the persons in charge of its management and coordinating bodies.

Instruction 1/2010, of 9 September, of the Central Electoral Commission, on the application of Article 44.2 of the Organic Law on the General Electoral System with regard to the constitution of electoral coalitions.

Groupings of voters are political formations constituted with the endorsement of a variable number of signatures of voters and exclusively in order to be able to present a candidacy in a specific and determined electoral process.

They are not, therefore, permanent or an association and do not need to be registered in the Register of Political Parties.

Each group of electors is autonomous and independent from any other. Its spatial scope of action is the electoral constituency - without the possibility of collective candidacies, or covering more than one constituency, or federations or coalitions between them - and its period of validity is the specific electoral process for which it was constituted, and cannot be extended beyond it.

Groupings of voters require the signatures of 15,000 voters in order to present candidacies for the European Parliament elections.

The presentation of the candidacy (made on the forms which can be downloaded from this website) must be accompanied by the documentation set out in the Instruction of the Central Electoral Board of 15 March 1999

  • An uncertified photocopy of the ID card of each candidate:

  • A written statement on plain paper signed by each candidate declaring, on oath, that he/she is not subject to any penalty of disqualification from standing as a candidate and that he/she is not subject to any grounds for ineligibility, expressly declaring acceptance of his/her candidacy.

  • This may be a single document signed by all the candidates or a single individually signed document.

  • The statement is provided with an oath or promise declaring that he/she is not disqualified from standing as a candidate, although this may be replaced by a negative criminal record certificate (Resolutions of the Central Electoral Board of 3 May 1999).

In accordance with Royal Decree 100/2014, of 21 February, establishing certain provisions regarding the exercise of the right to passive suffrage in the European Parliament elections

“1.- Citizens of the European Union residing in Spain who are nationals of another member State and who present their candidacies to the Central Electoral Board in order to exercise their right to passive suffrage in the European Parliament elections must provide, in addition to the documents required for candidates of Spanish nationality, a formal declaration, stating:

  • Their nationality, date and place of birth, their last address in their member State of origin and their address in Spain;

  • That they are not standing as candidates in European Parliament elections in another member State at the same time;

  • As appropriate, the local authority or constituency of the member State of origin on whose electoral roll they were last entered;

  • That they have not been deprived of their right to passive suffrage in their member State of origin on the basis of a decision by a judge or court of law or administrative decision of an individual nature, in so far as the latter may be appealed against before the courts. The Central Electoral Board shall also verify compliance with the eligibility requirements set out in the LOREG”.

“In addition, they are required to provide a certificate of registration on the electoral roll on the basis of the declaration of intent to exercise the right to vote in Spain in the elections in question. (Council Directive 93/109/EC of 6 December 1993, amended by Council Directive 2013/1/EU of 20 December 2012, and Instruction of the Central Electoral Board of 15 March 1999, Official State Gazette no. 67 of 19 March 1999)

The candidacies must be presented with all their documentation on paper, although not necessarily on the official template; their presentation on plain paper is therefore valid, provided that all the requirements for this purpose are met (Resolutions of the Central Electoral Board of 13 May 1999 and 23 April 2009).

The Electoral Administration (Electoral Board) has the duty to cooperate with the parties to rectify any irregularities, as the fundamental right to equal access to public office is at stake, which is manifested here in the exercise of the right to passive suffrage [i.e. right to be elected], which must be treated respectfully and favourably in the course of the electoral process. (Ruling of the Constitutional Court 86/1987 of 1 June).

Non-proclaimed candidacies shall not be published in the relevant Official Journal (Ag. CEB of 10 January 1996); the representative shall be informed of the reasoned decision for their non-proclamation, indicating any appeals.