Millions of Ethiopians across the
nation on Sunday went to the polls to cast their votes in local and city
council elections, which national observers described as peaceful and fair.
The National Electoral Board of
Ethiopia (NEBE) said elections has been conducted in a peaceful manner with a
big turnout of voters. The Chairperson of NEBE, Merga Bekane, said the election
could be considered as “exemplary to the international community”.
“The election was a great success it
was stable, smooth, effective and efficient in all directions” Merga told
reporters.
He said voters participated enormously
and very actively. According to Merga, more than 90% of the country’s total
31.6 million registered voters cast ballots.
The chairperson added that election
officers served their voters as much as required and as much they were trained.
Voters and opposition observers told Sudan
Tribune that they have witnessed a transparent, peaceful and democratic
election process.
The observers added that they had not
witnessed any visible irregularities that warranted making an official
complaint.
However, an opposition official who
refused to be named told Sudan Tribune that election officers in some
polling station were not effectively guiding voters on how they have to cast
votes creating confusion.
The Ethiopian electoral board said it
has not received any complaint from opposition parties so far.
“The legal judiciary and the law
enforcement teams were so patient to receive any complaint” Merga said adding
that they have been "on standby" but are yet to receive any
compliants.
Merga commended contesting political
parties for the excellent discipline they displayed during the election
process.
Government officials said that the
participation of every stakeholder indicates that the Ethiopian people are want
to help the growth of democracy in the horn of Africa nation, which has a
history of poor election processes.
Some 200 street protesters were killed
following disputed elections in 2005. However the EPRDF led government has then
after managed to hold peaceful and transparent national elections.
After the closure of polling stations
on Sunday evening, ballot counting has begun but the official outcome will not
be announced until 10 May 2013.
Over 200,000 public observers
witnessed Sunday’s vote, which was held at nearly 45,000 polling stations
across nation with a total of 3.6 million candidates are running.
No comments:
Post a Comment