- 47 - CDL-AD(2020)025 applicant party was prevented from standing for election. It followed that, by using the supervisory-review procedure to set aside the judgment of 22 November 1999, the domestic authorities violated the principle of legal certainty in the procedure for determining the applicant party’s eligibility to stand in the elections. (d) Effective remedies The body responsible for examining a complaint challenging election results and seeking recount must be impartial and operate through a procedure ensuring adequate and sufficient safeguards. Specific case: In Mugemangango v. Belgium (no. 310/15, 10 July 2020) the applicant party alleged, in particular, that the refusal of the Walloon Parliament to recount the ballot papers declared blank, spoiled or disputed in the Charleroi constituency, after it had acted as both judge and party in the examination of his complaint, had infringed his right to stand as a candidate in free elections. The applicant stood on 25 May 2014 in the election to the Parliament of the Walloon Region. He was not elected and subsequently lodged a complaint with the Walloon Parliament, the competent body, requesting a recount of ballot papers, alleging numerous problems during the post-counting operations. The Walloon Parliament declared Mr Mugemangango’s complaint admissible but ill-founded concluding, among other things, that there was no compelling evidence of irregularities in the vote counting. Mr Mugemangango alleged that the refusal of the Walloon Parliament to recount the ballot papers declared blank, spoiled or disputed in the Charleroi constituency, after it had acted as both judge and party in the examination of his complaint, had infringed his right to stand as a candidate in free elections. He also submitted that his appeal to the Walloon Parliament had not constituted an effective remedy. The Court concluded that Mr Mugemangango’s complaint had been examined by a body which had not provided the requisite guarantees of its impartiality and whose discretion had not been circumscribed with sufficient precision by provisions of domestic law. The safeguards afforded to Mr Mugemangango during the procedure had likewise been insufficient, having been introduced on a discretionary basis. The Court thus concluded that Mr Mugemangango’s grievances had not been dealt with in a procedure offering adequate and sufficient safeguards to prevent arbitrariness and to ensure their effective examination in accordance with the requirements of Article 3 of Protocol No. 1. There had therefore been a violation of that Article. Moreover, the Court found that the procedure for complaints to the Walloon Parliament had not provided adequate and sufficient safeguards ensuring the effective examination of Mr Mugemangango’s grievances. (e) Transparency and independence of decision-taking bodies It is important for the authorities in charge of electoral administration to function in a transparent manner and to maintain impartiality and independence from political manipulation.199 Specific case: In Georgian Labour Party v. Georgia (no. 9103/04, ECHR 2008) one of the complaints was about the composition of the electoral commissions at the time of the repeat parliamentary 199 See Georgian Labour Party v. Georgia, no. 9103/04, § 101, ECHR 2008.