Opinion
Credit score: John Wessels/AFP by way of Getty Picture
– Folks went to the polls in Sierra Leone on 24 June to choose a president, parliament and municipal representatives. Outcomes had been rapidly introduced and the president sworn in for a second time period. However a cloud of doubt lingers.
Runner-up cries foul
The presidential race supplied a repeat of the earlier vote in 2018, when Julius Madaa Bio beat Samura Kamara in a carefully fought runoff, 51.8 per cent to 48.2 per cent. However regardless of the economic system being in worse form than 5 years in the past – one thing that may be anticipated to value the incumbent help – this time spherical Bio’s lead was greater. He took 56.2 per cent to Kamara’s 41.2 per cent within the first spherical, narrowly clearing the 55 per cent threshold wanted to keep away from a runoff.
Kamara and his occasion, the All Folks’s Congress (APC), instantly cried foul and demanded a rerun, saying there have been ‘obtrusive irregularities’. Whereas observers from the African Union and Financial Group of West African States declared the elections free and honest, others expressed considerations. European Union observers pointed to ‘statistical inconsistencies’ within the presidential election outcomes. These embody very excessive turnout in some districts and a really low variety of invalid votes. As well as, seals had been reportedly broken on some poll bins earlier than votes had been counted.
National Election Watch, a coalition of over 400 home and worldwide civil society organisations (CSOs), has additionally reported considerations. It deployed 6,000 observers, overlaying each polling station, and used a sampling approach to estimate the outcomes – a way that carefully matched the ultimate tallies on the final three elections. However this time its outcomes disagreed on all the important thing figures: ranges of help for the 2 principal candidates, turnout and the quantity of invalid votes. Primarily based on its evaluation, neither candidate was anticipated to clear the 55 per cent hurdle.
For transparency, home and worldwide observers are calling on the electoral fee to publish detailed outcomes with knowledge disaggregated by polling station. The fee has mentioned it should accomplish that however it should take a while.
The shadow of violence
Bio has already been sworn in for his second time period. His occasion, the Sierra Leone Folks’s Social gathering (SLPP), has additionally been declared the clear winner of parliamentary elections, taking 60 per cent of seats.
The 2 sides nonetheless appear set to proceed at loggerheads. The APC has mentioned it won’t take part in authorities at any stage, together with parliament and municipal councils, whereas state officers have mentioned that feedback from civil society and overseas governments might inflame tensions and Bio has accused governments which have expressed concern of political interference.
Over all this lurks the shadow of violence. The scars of the nation’s 1991 to 2002 civil struggle, when tens of hundreds had been killed, nonetheless run deep, and any outbreak of violence sparks fears of escalation. On election day, violence was seen at a small variety of polling stations. Through the marketing campaign, APC supporters complained of assaults within the south and east areas, the place SLPP backing is strongest, whereas SLLP members additionally reported violence by opposition followers.
A couple of days earlier than the election, violence broke out exterior the APC’s headquarters in Freetown, with one individual reported useless on account of a taking pictures, which the APC blamed on the police. A post-election assembly on the identical venue noticed police encompass the constructing and use firearms and teargas. Nurse and APC volunteer Hawa Dumbaya died after being shot within the head.
Clearly the priority shouldn’t solely be about public violence – it should even be about police violence. Folks don’t must look again so far as the civil struggle to see the hazard. Final yr protests sparked by hovering meals inflation turned deadly, and by the point calm had returned, over 20 protesters and bystanders and 6 law enforcement officials had been killed. In response to protest vandalism and property harm, the police had been alleged to have used reside ammunition.
Troublingly, Bio responded to those protests by claiming they had been acts of terrorism with the intent of overthrowing the federal government. He blamed the APC, since protests passed off in areas the place the occasion has most help. The federal government arrange a committee to research the violence, however its report adopted the federal government’s line.
Whereas the size of the 2022 violence was unprecedented in peacetime Sierra Leone, this wasn’t the primary occasion of the authorities responding to protests with extreme pressure. In the meantime nobody within the police has been held to account. It isn’t encouraging if recent protests now end result.
Transparency urgently wanted
Polls all the time put Bio forward, and the distribution of regional and ethnic loyalties favours him. Bio additionally forged alliances with some events that had beforehand ran in opposition to him, incentivised by modifications to the electoral system that made it tougher for smaller events to enter parliament. Nationwide Election Watch’s figures nonetheless recommend Bio was forward of Kamara – simply not by sufficient to keep away from the runoff.
The truth that Bio didn’t clear the runoff hurdle by a lot is the crux of the matter, as a result of comparatively small numbers of inaccuracies might have made the distinction between whether or not or not a second vote and continued campaigning passed off.
The essential query is what this now means for belief in democracy. If suspicions aren’t dispelled by the publication of detailed and disaggregated knowledge and allegations aren’t totally investigated, they are going to thrive and take maintain, even ought to they prove to not be true. That may solely be a setback for democracy. Sierra Leone’s folks have proven persistently excessive ranges of electoral turnout and proceed to favour democracy above some other regime. However in any nation, belief in democracy will be fragile and, as soon as misplaced, laborious to revive.
On this interval of uncertainty, each side have a accountability to chorus from inflammatory language and actions. The federal government should permit peaceable protests and make sure the police don’t reply with extreme pressure. There’s no approach ahead that includes violence, regardless of the supply.
Andrew Firmin is CIVICUS Editor-in-Chief, co-director and author for CIVICUS Lens and co-author of the State of Civil Society Report.
Supply: ipsnews
