POLITICS-YEMEN: Election Frauds Begin to Surface

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Nabil Sultan

SANA'A, May 6 2003 (IPS) - Opposition parties have threatened to boycott the new House of Representatives in protest against election violations.

The parties called a joint meeting Tuesday to demand a judicial inquiry into reports of widespread rigging across Yemen in elections held April 27.

The Supreme Committee for Elections and Referendum (SCER) had declared the ruling People’s General Congress (GPC) the winner with 214 seats in a 280- seat House. The Islamic party Islah won 40 seats, and the Yemeni Socialist Party won eight. The others went to independents and smaller groups. The turnout was a reported 76 per cent in an electorate of 8.9 million.

The Islah Party won a large number of its seats in the capital where the voting was under relative close scrutiny. But concern among opposition leaders has grown with reports coming in over recent days of widespread violations in far- flung areas.

The violations have been reported both by domestic and foreign observers.. The independent National Democratic Institute (NDI) based in the U.S. says in a report released here that several critical flaws were apparent in the election process.

"Those violations must be addressed effectively and in a sustained fashion if democratic progress is to be advanced, otherwise public confidence in Yemen’s commitment to democracy could be damaged," the institute said in its report..

The report listed instances of political intimidation, inappropriate behaviour by security forces, vote buying and obstruction of counting commissioners by members of the ruling GPC. Five people were killed in clashes at counting centres.

"In Sana’a Constituency 1, NDI election observers witnessed vote buying which involved underage voters," the NDI report says. "Two individuals were exchanging money, and reacted immediately to disassociate themselves from each other when the observers approached." The report lists several such violations.

"Every time we have elections, we find new election frauds," chairman of the Shura Council of the Islah party AbdulMajid al-Zindani told IPS.

The Yemeni Institute for Democracy Development said it had received a large number of complaints. It urged the SCER to address the violations.

The National Organisation of Media and Observers Support Team (MOST) said in its report that the voting had gone smoothly, but it also listed instances of voting by children. Its report says that many children between seven and 15 years of age had been seen queuing up to vote in Amran area and in other remote constituencies.

"Monitors cannot determine the difference that these votes made but candidates who used children in this way must be punished," lawyer Hamoud al-Haj told IPS.

"We are collecting reports of the irregularities and we will publish them soon," head of the political office of the Islah party Mohammad Qahtan told media representatives Tuesday. "We had been dreaming of a better future, but the rulers have denied us democracy itself."

GPC leaders say the opposition parties are looking for excuses for their failure because the people did not vote for them. But secretary-general of the GPC Abdulkarim al-Iryani admitted that his party had not expected the big Islah win in Sana’a.

Islah leaders allege that foreign forces could have played a hand. "The diseases came from outside Yemen," al-Zindani said. "Americans do not like Islamic parties to take power. They want Muslims to give up Islam." The GPC is playing into the hands of the U.S., he said.

President Ali Abdullah Saleh had spoken earlier of forming a coalition government with representation from all parties. Those possibilities have now disappeared.