Some Soviet Voters to Get a Choice in Local Elections

The Soviet Union will hold local council elections on June 21 in which voters in some districts will have a choice of candidates as part of an experiment in electoral reform, the Tass news agency reported Sunday.

The agency said the districts involved, still to be selected, will have a slate of candidates, not all of whom can be elected, and voters are to strike out the names of those they do not support.

Tass said that candidates in the elections will have to win support from more than 50% of the registered constituents to win seats. Voting is compulsory in the Soviet Union.

Until now, official returns for elections at most levels in the Soviet government system have recorded 99% to 100% support for all candidates. Voters simply dropped the official ballot with the single candidate’s name into a ballot box.

The Tass report followed pledges on electoral reform by Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev, who is campaigning to revitalize confidence in the Communist system after what he has described as a period of stagnation.

Gorbachev has said he wants to strengthen democracy and demonstrate to ordinary people that they can play a role in shaping policies, while warning public officials they will be accountable to their constituents.

Single candidates designated in the past often were selected by party officials at closed meetings. As a result, deputies to local councils as well as to the Supreme Soviet, the Soviet parliament, which is not currently involved in the voting experiment, often held their seats for many years and voters had little chance of removing them.

Since Gorbachev came to power in March, 1985, there has been an extensive weeding-out of Supreme Soviet deputies regarded as corrupt or inefficient.