The printing of almost four million ballot papers for the parliamentary elections, which will take place on Wednesday 17 April, began on Thursday at the Narodne Novine (Official Gazette) printing plant.

About 3,550,000 ballot papers will be printed for the 1st to 11th constituencies and about 430,000 for the 12th constituency, said a member and spokesman of the State Electoral Commission (DIP) Slaven Hojski.

The ballot papers for the ten constituencies in Croatia and constituency no. 11, which includes Croats with permanent residence abroad, are in “four times A4” format and cost a total of around €532,000 at 15 cents per sheet.

The ballot papers for the 12th constituency, where members of ethnic minorities vote, are in A4 format and cost 5 cents per sheet, totalling about €21,600, Hojski said.

He explained that other election material is also printed at Narodne Novine: about 10,000 notices for posting outside and inside polling stations and protocol sheets for all election committees.

Ballot boxes have also been prepared, 11,500 large ones and more than 9,000 smaller ones.

All in all, this material will cost about €748,000 and will use about 100 tonnes of paper, Hojski said.

He announced that on Friday the first ballot papers and voting material will be delivered to the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs to be sent to the most distant polling stations in North and South America and Australia.

Next week, the voting material will be sent to the European destinations and the most distant polling stations in Croatia, in constituencies 10, 4, 5 and so on.