The Election Code assumes to divide the Central Election commission into three parts between authorities, the parliamentary opposition, and independent MPs. The Council of Europe has been closely involved in the development of the EC project, as has the Baku office of the OSCE. A roundtable was organized by the OSCE in December 2002. However that format of consultations did not suit all interested parties, and the OSCE considered the opposition proposal to establish a conciliatory commission. Yet this attempt also failed. At the end of February, the consent about negotiating at an expert level without preliminary conditions was achieved.

On March 6, at the first meeting of the representative of the Opposition Coordination Center (OCC) Fuad Agayev with the head of department of presidential administration, Shahin Aliyev, it has been stipulated that experts will begin consultations on conceptual questions, and then will pass to item-by-item discussion. But on March 10, during the second meeting, the situation changed and the dialogue failed. Before this meeting, OCC charged Fuad Agayev to discuss only the question of formation of the election commissions and to explore the readiness of the authorities to discuss this most disputed issue.

OCC leaders have even declared that if authorities agree to discuss other options of the formation of the election commissions, they will withdraw all other proposals on changes to the law. In this situation when dialogue has been actually broken, the head of the Baku office of OSCE Peter Burkhard has declared that his organization suspends its intermediary activity between authorities and the opposition. “We can renew intermediary efforts if the sides desire. The different proposals of the structure of election commissions offered both by authorities and by the opposition cannot be considered appropriate, since both give the majority to one political pole” emphasized Burkhard.

In the opinion of OCC expert Agayev, the government is ready to discuss all questions connected to the Election code as a bloc, but not its separate parts, and in particular the formation of the election commissions. “The practice of implementation of the election legislation in Azerbaijan testifies that good statutes can be brought to nothing by the absence of an impartial election body. The opposition regards the question of election commissions as being of paramount importance. If these bodies do not represent a wide spectrum of political forces but only the governing party, they will serve the interests of this party”.

In an interview to TURAN news agency, Shahin Aliyev accused the opposition of proposing additional conditions and has declared it inadmissible to conduct a dialogue in this manner. Opposition Musavat Party chairman Isa Gambar declared that “Authorities are afraid of fair elections and consequently reject alternative variants of formation of the election commissions. The opposition, probably, would not object in the future to form the Central Election Commission from independents. However today they believe that there are no independent MPs in Parliament; all MPs not members of political parties are to some extent connected to the authorities. And for this reason, the opposition suggests to form the Central Election Commission from representatives of the authorities and the opposition”.

Representatives of the governing party “Yeni Azerbaijan” are of another opinion. YAP MP Sayad Aran decried the opposition’s position. “They demand to hold discussions only on questions of the formation of the Central Election Commission. But in fact the interests of non-party members should be taken into account. Their representatives too should be part of the CEC”. At the same time, discussion of the EC project is going on in the Parliament. Opposition Popular Front Party MP Ali Kerimli declared that carrying out free, fair and democratic elections does not mean only the association in one code all laws concerning this issue. “The requirement of the international organizations and the people consists in carrying out electoral reforms in the country. It is necessary to take into account remarks and proposals of the opposition”.

However, others disagreed. According to independent MP Jahangir Huseynov, the EC proposal is optimal. “Some details may be corrected. However as a whole, I think that this document corresponds to democratic norms. At the same time the regulations about structure of the CEC are optimal: without participation of representatives of independent MPs - independent lawyers - it is impossible to form the Central Election Commission”. The initiative of the Baku office of OSCE to organize a dialogue between opposition and authorities failed because of the inconsistent position of this international organization. Opposition and analysts have argued that the head of the Baku office of OSCE first of all consults with representatives of official Baku, and then informs opposition. The same was true with the dialogue on the EC.