POLITICS-SIERRA LEONE: Growing Concerns about Free and Fair Polls

By Lansana Fofana Reprint | | Print |

Lansana Fofana

Freetown, Feb 14 2002 (IPS) - Sierra Leone’s more than 20 political parties have expressed doubts about the ability of the country’s National Electoral Commission (NEC) to conduct free and fair elections, and accused the ruling party of not genuinely committed to creating a level playing field for the May 14 polls.

Last week, the opposition in apparent frustration at what it considered fraudulent voter registration exercise gave NEC a 24- hour ultimatum to halt the ongoing exercise until the alleged anomalies are thoroughly rectified. This, however, did not happen.

Targeting a voter population of more than two million, the electoral commission set up some 5,000 registration centres across the country and gave a two-week period for completion of the exercise.

Fumed Victor Foh, a senior official of the All Peoples congress (APC): “This is totally unacceptable. The time span is short and NEC knows it cannot achieve this target”.

Foh charges the ruling Sierra Leone People’s party (SLPP) of President Kabbah is bent on rigging the elections by fraudulently manipulating the commission.

Before then, voters were registered in their homes and did not have to cover miles in search of registration centres. “This system is alien to our people and would certainly disenfranchise many especially the aged, sick and infirm,” complained Morie Sillah of the Grand Alliance Party.

Also contentious is the estimate for allocation of voters per region. It is believed that more voters are allocated to the southern and eastern regions which are clearly stronghold of the ruling party, while the north and west believed to be sympathetic to the opposition are deliberately under-populated by NEC officials.

“The estimates defy common sense and could only be interpreted as a deliberated machination to allocate more voter to the stronghold of a particular (SLPP) political party,” remarked the National Forum for Human Rights, a coalition of rights monitoring groups.

This, according to the forum, sends the wrong signals for possible elections irregularities. “The rigging of elections does not only occur on the day of voting and counting; it could start from the very start of the process,” the forum observed.

The introduction of a new system of voting by the NEC called the District Block System is also alien to the voters and only helped to confuse the electorate further. According to this system, candidates do not seek their mandates from individual constituencies. Rather, a list of candidates is drawn for districts, and so after elections, parliamentarians owe their allegiance to the district.

The government says it cannot cope with the single member constituency of first past the post system because of time constraints and the unavailability of enough funds. Analysts, however, believe this is a recipe for chaos.

Civil society groups and rights activists have formed the opposition to question the impartiality of the National Electoral Commission whose official were hand- picked by the government. They have called for its dissolution and eventual replacement by an acceptable commission.

Political analyst Sam Kamara said: “why do we have to wait until there is real trouble? I mean the government cannot just dismiss the legitimate grievances of the opposition. After all, the dust is yet to settle after the decade-long war and such problems are certainly conflict raisers.”

There is now the key question of how to manage the elections so that the country does not slip back to war. It is clearly worrying that the most feared rebel group, the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), is taking part in the May elections as a political party.

The rebels recently disarmed to UN peacekeepers but are threatening to fight back if the elections are not freely and fairly conducted. They are also demanding the release of their detained leader Foday Sankoh, who is being held by the government in the capital Freetown.

In the circumstances, the opposition is calling for greater involvement of the UN Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL). The opposition is demanding that the mandate of the Mission – with its 17,000 troops – involve support for the electoral commission to conduct free and fair elections.

The mission would help with the provision of security during polling day, help transport elections’ materials and ensure that the polls are conducted freely and in a violence-free environment.

More UN civilian police would be deployed at polling stations and UNAMSIL has said it would not allow the elections to reverse the gains made in the peace process. A spokesperson of the mission told IPS: “we know that the elections are a major step in the consolidation of peace. But we would not allow them to break the very peace. So we are not going to play any marginal role.

“This may be refreshing for the opposition but serious questions still remain. For instance, the government still maintains a state of public emergency that bars political gatherings and rallies. It also empowers the president of the republic to order the detention of any person thought to be a threat to the public peace and tranquillity.

While this executive order is in force, and has been there for the better part of President Kabbah’s five-year term in office, the ruling party goes around the country campaigning, thus having an undue advantage over the opposition.

The hope and prayer among war-weary Sierra Leoneans now is that the May 14 elections go ahead peacefully and a new government sworn-in. It would certainly be a major test for the country’s newfound peace after years of killing, maiming and destruction.