Democracy for Africa

Friday, July 23, 2010

Guinea Presidential Run-Off Possible Within 2 Weeks

Anne Look | Dakar21 July 2010

Photo: AFP

Candidate for the Guinean presidency Cellou Dalein Diallo smiles to the crowd, 27 Jun 2010

Guinea's Supreme Court has rejected challenges to first-round results in the country's presidential poll, and a run-off between the two top-scoring candidates could now take place in as little as two weeks.

The head of Guinea's Supreme Court, Mamadou Sylla, announced definitive results Tuesday for the first round of the country's landmark presidential election that took place June 27.

The Supreme Court overruled challenges to the provisional results brought by many of the first round's 24 presidential candidates. The court threw out votes from five districts including a part of the capital Conakry, citing severe irregularities.

According to definitive results, former prime minister, Cellou Dallein Diallo, led the first round with 43 percent of votes, and long-time opposition leader, Alpha Conde, came in second, with 18 percent. Former prime minister, Sidya Toure, remained in third place with 13 percent.

Mr. Diallo and Mr. Conde will face off in a second round of voting the electoral commission says could take place within two weeks.

Spokesman Fodé Oussou Fofana, who represents Mr. Diallo's party, the Union for Democratic Forces in Guinea says Mr. Diallo's campaign will continue with its same strategy of fraternity among all Guineans. He says they are now reaching out to all political parties who share their vision for Guinea. He says the problem in Guinea is not ethnicity, but rather poverty. He says they are committed to bringing the country out of misery.

Coalition building is under way for the second round of voting.

Bakary Diabaté is spokesman for the party of candidate Lansana Kouyaté, who placed fourth in the first round.

Diabaté says there is still hope for Guinea and that they will not give up. He says choosing alliances for the run-off is a political decision. He says the party submitted its challenges to first-round results to the Supreme Court and the court has ruled. He says the party will now meet to decide its position for the second round.

The presidential poll is meant to return the country to civilian government after a military coup in December 2008 and many hope it will be the country's first free and fair presidential election since independence in 1958.

Despite logistical challenges, the first round of voting was largely applauded by international observers.

The electoral commission has not yet announced a date for the second round.

Burundi Parliamentary Vote Begins Friday

Peter Clottey22 July 2010
Photo: AFP
Burundi's main opposition leader Agathon Rwasa sits underneath the portrait of Burundian President Pierre Nkurunziza during an interview with journalists in the south western Burundian town of Rumonge, 12 May 2010
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A leading member of Burundi’s opposition Forces for National Liberation (FNL) has called on supporters of his party as well as other opposition parties to boycott the parliamentary election scheduled to begin Friday.
Jean-Bosco Habyarimana, spokesman for the FNL accused both President Pierre Nkurunziza’s government and the Independent Electoral Commission (CENI) of undermining the credibility of the parliamentary vote.
“It was known that we will not participate in this election. You remember we rejected the results of the (local) election because of the fraud that characterized those elections. We requested for a dialogue in which we could maybe correct the problems and then try to get a solution but the government refused,” he said.
Burundi’s opposition groups rejected the results of the 24^th May local elections, saying it was fraught with irregularities and voter intimidation. They demanded a re-run of the vote. But, the electoral commission refused, saying the election was transparent and credible.
Pierre Claver Ndayicariye, chairman of the electoral body said the parliamentary vote will continue as planned despite the opposition boycott.
But, opposition leader Habyarimana said his party will not participate in an election in which the ruling National Council for the Defense of Democracy-Forces for the Defense of Democracy (CNDD-FDD) is pre-determined to win.
“The one who refused us is the one who refused the dialogue so that we can correct the faults that characterized the community elections. He is the one who (prevented) us from continuing in the electoral process,” Habyarimana said.
He also described Friday’s vote as illegal.
“All what is being done is against the law” he said.
Habyarimana said despite the boycott his party will continue to offer stiff opposition to President Pierre Nkurunziza’s government.

Wednesday, April 7, 2010

EU Withdraws Election Observers From Darfur

VOA News07 April 2010

The European Union is withdrawing its election observers from Sudan's Darfur region, just four days before Sudan begins national elections.

EU mission chief Veronique de Keyser told reporters of the move Wednesday, after flying into the North Darfur capital of El-Fasher to meet the team of six monitors. De Keyser said earlier that she was concerned about the observers' safety, and that they would not have sufficient access to credibly evaluate the polls.

President Omar al-Bashir has threatened to expel international observers who push for a delay in the elections. He also threatened to cut the tongues out of any observer who "insults" Sudan.

Sudan is due to begin three days of presidential, parliamentary and regional elections on Sunday. However, a number of opposition parties have declared a boycott of the presidential vote.

Late Tuesday, the main political party in Sudan's southern region said it also will boycott the legislative and local polls in the north of the country.

The parties accuse the ruling National Congress Party of preparing to rig the results.

The government has rejected opposition calls for a delay, insisting that the first multi-party elections in Sudan since 1986 will take place on schedule.

These elections are a key part of the 2005 peace accord that ended a 21-year civil war between Sudan's northern and southern regions. This is a prelude to a referendum scheduled to be held in January on whether the semi-autonomous south will become completely independent.

The war in Darfur, a separate conflict, has raged since 2003. The United Nations says the fighting and related violence has killed up to 300,000 people and displaced some 2.7 million others. Sudan puts the death toll much lower, at 10,000.

Friday, March 5, 2010

Ivory Coast Elections Could be Delayed Again

Anne Look | Dakar

Photo: VOA

Controversy over the voter list in Ivory Coast is threatening to once again push back long-delayed presidential elections. Election-related protests erupted around Ivory Coast this past week.

Ivorian investigators have confirmed evidence of "fraud" in the voter list for the country's upcoming presidential elections.

President Laurent Gbagbo accused the Independent Electoral Commission in January of approving a voter list that contained the names of almost a half million foreigners. The accusations were followed by calls for electoral commission head, Robert Mambé, to resign.

Announcing the investigators' findings Friday, spokesman Mohamed Diakité said the consequences of this alleged fraud were "extremely serious."

He says despite opposition from electoral commission members, its central committee and President Gbagbo, electoral commission head Robert Mambé gave the unauthorized names to the technicians who then added them to most of the lists. He says this finding brings the legitimacy of the electoral list into question.

Mambé, an opposition member, said he does not plan to resign and the voter list in question should never have been released.

He says he will continue to fight to finish what he knew from the beginning would be a difficult mission. He says he did not commit fraud nor did he instruct others to commit fraud.

The vote is an attempt to find a lasting political solution to nearly a decade of internal conflict in the once stable West African nation, but voter registration issues have prompted Ivory Coast to push back the election several times since President Laurent Gbagbo's mandate ran out in 2005.

Questions of nationality were at the heart of the civil war in 2002 and remain sensitive in Ivory Coast, which has a large immigrant population. Observers say recent political stalemate demonstrates just how far the country is from resolving the questions of "Who is Ivorian?" and "Who can vote?"

Last week, mounting frustration erupted into violent protests outside courthouses around the country, first in Katiola and Divo, where one police officer was killed, and finally in Man, near the Liberian border, on Friday. Thousands of people there stormed the courthouse, accusing the magistrate of trying to strike them from the voter list.

The former rebel faction in the North, the New Forces, had released a statement earlier denouncing what they called attempts to remove northerners from the provisional voter rolls, by questioning their nationality without proof. They cautioned against the "unpredictable consequences these attempts to strip people of their nationality could provoke."

Justice Minister Mamadou Koné has not only condemned the outbreaks of violence, but also called for local magistrates to follow proper legal protocol when seeking to remove people from the voter rolls. State security forces prevented him from reading his statement on national television.

Opposition members have accused Mr. Gbagbo's party of pressuring courts to remove people from the voter list and of stalling elections to remain in power. The opposition continues to call for the poll to happen in March, as planned.

The U.N. peacekeeping mission in Ivory Coast has called for calm and continues to urge the country to organize elections as soon as possible.

The deadline for the publication of the definitive voter list has been pushed back to February 14, and observers say recent political disputes make holding an election in March near impossible.

VOA

Togo Opposition, Ruling Party Both Declare Victory in Presidential Vote

Opposition candidate Fabre says Thursday's vote was full of irregularities

Scott Stearns | Abuja05 March 2010

A Togolese policeman walks by a poster supporting opposition presidential candidate Jean-Pierre Fabre in Lome, Togo on the final day of campaigning, Tuesday, March 2, 2010.

Photo: ASSOCIATED PRESS

A Togolese policeman walks by a poster supporting opposition presidential candidate Jean-Pierre Fabre in Lome, Togo - File Photo

Togo Voting Calm, Despite Fears of Violence

Togo's main opposition candidate and its ruling-party are both declaring victory in Thursday's presidential election as vote counting continues.

Opposition candidate Jean-Pierre Fabre says Thursday's vote was full of irregularities, but he remains confident of victory.

Fabre told reporters in Lome late Friday that according to results complied by his Union of Forces for Change party, they are averaging between 75 and 80 percent of the vote, a total that he says would have been higher without anomalies that he says included stuffing ballot boxes.

Government spokesman Pascal Bodjona disputes that claim. He told French radio that the ruling Rally for the Togolese People party and President Faure Gnassingbe have won what he called a resounding victory. A ruling-party statement called on opposition leaders to regroup so as to preserve the general calm that prevailed during this vote.

The United Nations says more than 400 people were killed in post-election violence in 2005 that also sent thousands of Togolese refugees into Ghana and Benin.

President Gnassingbe is running for re-election after winning that 2005 vote following the death of his father, Gnassingbe Eyadema, who ruled Togo for more than 38 years.

Before Thursday's vote, Fabre said he had no confidence in the fairness of the ballot and suspected that President Gnassingbe would manipulate the electoral commission to steal the vote.

The president said an unprecedented deployment of Togolese and regional security forces would help guarantee a fair ballot. Casing his vote, he said it was up to voters to decide if he would be re-elected.

Final results are expected Saturday or Sunday.

VOA NEWS

Togo Voting Calm, Despite Fears of Violence

Anne Look | Dakar05 March 2010

Photo: AP

A Togolese man casts his vote for president as international and national poll observers inspect a polling station in Lome, Togo, 04 Mar 2010

Togo Opposition, Ruling Party Both Declare Victory in Presidential Vote

Voting was peaceful in Togo's presidential poll Thursday, despite fears of violence and fraud.

Election officials in Togo counted ballots aloud after polls closed Thursday in the country's presidential election.

The poll was widely seen as a test of the democratic process in the West African country. Its last presidential election in 2005 was marked by violence and accusations of vote tampering.

But voters leaving the polls Thursday in the capital city, Lome, were for the most part pleased with the calm in which people cast their ballots.

A voter in Lome says the voting happened in an orderly fashion. He says the only problem he noticed were the people who could not find their names on the voter lists and were forced to go from center to center to find where they should vote. He says he is concerned about transparency in the counting of the votes, but he hopes this election will bring about change in Togo.

Security forces were on hand, but there were no reports of violence.

Missions from the European Union and the 15-member Economic Community of West African States were on the ground to help ensure that Thursday's vote went smoothly.

An ECOWAS observer says he is pleased with the transparency and calm with which the voting took place. He says they did not note any incidents in the capital city. He says they also observed the counting of votes in several polling places.

Heads of polling places around the capital also pointed to the peace and transparency with which the casting and counting of votes had taken place.

At the polls, current president, Faure Gnassingbe, faced six opposition candidates in his run for a second term.

He is the son of late dictator Gnassingbe Eyadema, who ruled the country for 38 years, and his election in 2005 was a highly-contested vote that resulted in violence that left hundreds dead and displaced tens of thousands.

The results of the presidential race are expected to be announced Sunday.

VOA

Togo opposition claims 'irregularities' in poll

President Faure Gnassingbe is running for a second term

The main opposition party in Togo has claimed widespread irregularities in the country's presidential election.

People in Togo voted on Thursday to chose a new head of state - five years after hundreds died following the last, disputed election.

President Faure Gnassingbe is running for a second term, and his main challenger is Jean Pierre Fabre of the Union of Forces for Change (UFC).

All parties have been stressing the need for a peaceful poll.

The UFC has pointed to several problems with the voting that it says could lead to fraud.

The ballot papers did not have serial numbers, only the stubs did, says the BBC's Caspar Leighton in Lome.

The numberless ballot papers can be used to stuff ballot boxes from elsewhere, the UFC says.

"The electoral code has not been respected. Nothing has been done today to ensure the transparency of this vote," the UFC head of communications Eric Dupuy told the BBC.

More than 500 observers from the African Union, the West African group Ecowas and the European Union are monitoring the vote.

An election observer in Lome told the BBC the process so far was "slow but peaceful".

Correspondents say President Gnassingbe is hoping to be re-elected in circumstances that will win the approval that was so lacking at the last election.

'No chances'

The 2005 vote happened soon after the military had installed him in power on the death of his father, Gnassingbe Eyadema.

The main opposition party, the UFC, believes it won the last election.

Hundreds died in ensuing protests. Campaigning this time around was peaceful and at times strayed into good-natured rivalry.

But the authorities took no chances and mixed the message of harmony with the presence of a 6,000-strong election security force.

The structures in place for this election pointed to a desire to be seen to be doing the right thing.

For the first time there was an independent electoral commission.

The government website was being more than just a government mouthpiece and talked in fair terms about the opposition campaigns.

The electoral commissioner said election results should be ready after 72 hours. But there is a lack of clarity about how long the counting will actually take, our correspondent says.

Source: BBC

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