The prospect of Angola holding free and fair parliamentary elections in September is diminishing, according to a recent report by Human Rights Watch (HRW), a watchdog organisation.

Georgette Gagnon, HRW's Africa director, said in a statement that with "less than a month before elections, it's clear Angolans aren't able to campaign free from intimidation or pressure and unless things change now, Angolans won't be able to cast their votes freely."

The poll for the National Assembly is scheduled for 5 September and will be first elections since the combined presidential and parliamentary poll during a brief cessation in the civil war, in 1992, after which the conflict reignited over electoral disagreements.

Peace was achieved in 2002 in the wake of the killing of Jonas Savimbi, leader of the anti-government National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA).

Presidential elections are scheduled for 2009 and will coincide with the anniversary marking 30 years of rule by President Jose Eduardo dos Santos in one of Africa's main oil-exporting countries. No date for the presidential poll has been set.

Dos Santos said earlier this month “In this competition (elections) there are no enemies, there are political opponents only, with different political programes that will seek to attract the highest number of votes to conquer the power and exert it with legitimacy.”

However, Gagnon said "Angolans need to see improvements now if September's poll is to have a chance of meeting the basic requirements of a free election."

In a statement HRW said Angola's MPLA government was failing to adhere to electoral guidelines established by the regional body, the Southern African Development Community (SADC), of which Angola is a member.

Angola's poll will be the third major election in the SADC region this year, and while Botswana's elections passed off without a hitch, the SADC remains embroiled in the fallout from Zimbabwe's elections, which were declared as falling short of the body's electoral standards.

HRW conducted research in the Angolan capital, Luanda, the Cabinda enclave, and the central provinces of Huambo, Bie and Benguela, between March and June 2008, and found the government was "failing to fully ensure the right to free elections, and other rights critical to a fair poll, including the freedoms of expression and assembly".

The rights body said incidents of political violence were occurring, mainly in the country's rural areas, which had been fiercely contested during the three decades of civil war between the MPLA and UNITA.

"Patterns of violence include sporadic assaults by local MPLA supporters, sometimes involving traditional authorities and local MPLA leaders, against local UNITA party members and their property and party symbols," the HRW said. Traditional leaders in the provinces were also increasingly being targeted by the MPLA in a bid to thwart UNITA's political activities.

Citing an example of this trend, the HRW said: "On May 30 (2008), a group of 30 MPLA supporters beat the traditional leader, Pedro Pomba, in the village of Bongue Kandala [Kapupa commune, Cubal Municipality, Benguela] together with five UNITA members, on the grounds that he allowed a UNITA flag to fly in the village two days before."

Cabinda

Despite a 2006 peace agreement signed with a faction of the separatist group, the Liberation Front of the Enclave of Cabinda (FLEC), HRW said "a low-intensity, but still violent, separatist conflict and heightened military presence continues in the province."
The rights group said government intimidation, military detention, and restrictions on freedom of expression and assembly "significantly undermined" any chance of free and fair elections in the restive province that is the source of most of Angola's oil.

Earlier this year a manifesto was signed by thousands of Cabindan residents calling for dialogue to solve Cabinda's claim to self-determination, and promote debate on issues concerning autonomy.

"No such discussions have occurred and there is little space for expressing such opinions," HRW noted after finding that such expressions attracted the ire of the authorities.

"In August 2007, Mateus Massinga, the provincial secretary of the opposition Frente para a Democracia (Front for Democracy), was sentenced to five months in prison, suspended for two years, for 'insubordination and incitement of violence' after attempting to distribute a news release supporting autonomy," HRW said.

Electoral oversight

The rights body said the National Electoral Commission (CNE), the 11-member oversight body for elections, chaired by the deputy president of the Supreme Court, was not independent and the "majority of the CNE members are effectively appointed by the ruling party."

Attempts by civil society to access the voters' register, compiled by a government agency between November 2006 and May 2008, to conduct an independent audit have been denied. "The central voter register seems to be property of the CIPE (Inter-Ministerial Commission for the Electoral Process) and the government," HRW commented.

A presenter at the state television broadcaster was suspended after admitting publicly to MPLA interference in its editorial policy, and legal proceedings against the independent media have accelerated.

"In June 2008, a court sentenced the director of the independent weekly newspaper, Semanario Angolense (Angola Weekly), Felisberto Graça Campos, to a six-month prison sentence and ordered him to pay US$90,000 in damages following his conviction in three separate libel cases filed by government officials, which had been pending for years," HRW said.

A recent government press statement said all political "parties and coalitions will have an air time for radio and TV broadcasting, to expose their messages and present their government programmes and their electoral manifestoes."

IRIN 

The AGM will also hear reports from the president, development officer and treasurer among others.

According to The Gambia Cricket Association members are expected to settle a registration fee of D10.00 before being eligible to take part in the process.

The positions to be elected include president, vice president, secretary general and assistant with five elected members.

Independent observers and civil society groups in Ghana say voter registration, the first major step towards landmark general elections in December, is being marred by violence and irregularities.

In the north of Ghana supporters of the two main political parties – the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) - vandalised registration centres on 2 August and gun shots were heard in Tamale, the capital of the northern region, during voter registration.

The Media Foundation for West Africa, a press-freedom monitoring group, warned that five journalists covering voter registration in Tamale were attacked by supporters from both parties.

One of the journalists, Alhassan Abdul Ganiuw Brigandi, with local newspaper The Independent, was filing a report on the registration of underage voters allegedly transported to the voting station by NDC supporters.

On 6 August, one person sustained serious knife wounds and two people were arrested by the police in another clash in the Volta Region of southeastern Ghana.

“I am not surprised at the acrimony; it’s definitely a crucial election, but the parties must first protect the peace,” said Kwesi Amakye, a political science lecturer at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, in Accra.

Accusations

Ghanaians will vote on 7 December to elect a new president and members of parliament. The election is seen as a landmark because it is the first time in the country’s democratic history that a president who won power in democratic elections has served his constitutionally mandated two four-year terms and has to hand over the presidency.

Polls suggest the election will be close and is likely to go into a run-off.

Registering newly qualified voters who have just reached the voting age of 18 and adults who have never registered before is the first major step towards the elections.

Spokespeople for the NPP and NDC contacted by IRIN denied their supporters were involved in violence or illegal registration activities. Each accused the other of being responsible.

However, the Coalition of Domestic Election Observers, an elections watchdog, said in a statement issued on 4 August that the violence and irregularities have been “widespread”.

David Adanzee-Kangah, deputy chairman of Ghana’s Electoral Commission, the government body mandated to organise and facilitate elections, said the disturbances are “unprecedented” in Ghana’s recent political history.

Concerns

Observers are concerned not just about the clashes but also the registration process itself.

“Our main concern is that political parties are sponsoring minors to go and register so they can vote illegally come election day,” said John Lavea, the Programme Coordinator at the Centre for Democratic Development, a member of the Coalition of Domestic Election Observers.

Lavea says the coalition has also had reports of non-Ghanaians from neighbouring countries being paid to cross the border to register so they can vote in the elections in December.

The police in the Volta Region of Ghana, which shares a border with Togo, have arrested two people suspected of registering Togolese in the ongoing voter registration exercise said Assistant Commissioner of Police, Kofi Adei-Akyeampong.

The registration exercise, which is scheduled to run for 10 days, has also suffered some administrative challenges as registration centres have received far more people than expected.

In some parts of Ghana, people have started queuing at midnight to be sure of getting into the registration centres the next days.

Adanzee-Kangah, Deputy Chairman of the Electoral Commission, said this is “an abnormal situation never before seen in the history of this exercise”.

IRIN

The already high levels of politically motivated violence in Zimbabwe's rural areas are escalating, the opposition Movement for Democratic Change told IRIN.

Violence surged in the aftermath of the 29 March elections, in which ZANU-PF lost it majority in parliament for the first time since independence from Britain in 1980, and its leader, Robert Mugabe, come off second best to MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai in the presidential ballot. It continued in the lead-up to the second round of presidential voting on 27 June.

The presidential run-off ballot was deemed necessary after neither presidential candidate managed to achieve the 50 percent plus one vote required for an outright win.

In the interregnum between the 29 March and 27 June polls, there were reports of widespread violence, torture and internal displacement, which, according to the MDC, resulted in the deaths of more than 80 of their supporters and led to Tsvangirai's decision to withdraw his candidacy.

Mugabe, who has ruled for 28 years, claimed a landslide victory in the second round.

Rape as a weapon

Pishai Muchauraya, the MDC spokesperson for the country's eastern province of Manicaland and newly elected parliamentarian for Makoni South, told IRIN the violence intensified after Mugabe was sworn in as president two days after the vote, on the eve of the African Union summit in Egypt.
"The torture camps are still in place, and since the beginning of July three supporters of the MDC have been murdered by ZANU-PF militia and war veterans at the torture camps. Several women, including a 70-year-old grandmother and a 15-year-old girl, have been gang-raped, while beatings and displacements continue. People are being forced to donate goats, cattle and women to the bases to avoid being victims."

Rape was being used as a "deplorable" weapon against those perceived as not supporting ZANU-PF, and "In many instances, the victims cannot remember the number of people who raped them but it is usually more than 20, and that increases the chances of infecting the victims with HIV/AIDS," Muchauraya said.

"The perpetrators ... also expose themselves to infection, which could have a significant impact on reversing the impact of the HIV/AIDS pandemic."

Muchauraya said "the siege" by government supporters was an attempt to change the political culture and thinking in rural areas, and that rather than being dismantled, "more torture camps are being established."

During the independence war against white rule, the rural areas were the bastion of support for Zimbabwe's guerrilla armies, and the rural vote against the ruling ZANU-PF in the recent elections was seen as an insult by the country's ruling elite, according to political analysts.

"The international community has rejected the 27 June circus, in which Robert Mugabe contested against himself and declared himself the winner. ZANU-PF is subjugating everybody, so that if another election is called, and even if it was free and fair, people would vote for ZANU-PF out of fear," Muchauraya said.

Social welfare minister Nicholas Goche told IRIN the upsurge in violence was a consequence of the MDC attacking their own supporters in a bid to create sympathy among the international community.

"The MDC stage-managed these developments in order to coincide with the G8 summit [in Japan] so that Zimbabwe is put on the agenda. The idea is to give the impression that there is increasing political violence and that people are still being beaten, but all that is false."

In reaction to Goche's comment, MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa told IRIN: "As the MDC, we are deeply concerned by the upsurge in political violence, especially in the countryside. We are overwhelmed by the number of internally displaced persons who continue to flock to our offices.

"War veterans and ZANU-PF militia are behind these attacks. We have information that the torture chambers have not been dismantled and that new ones are being set up," he said.

Apparatus of violence

A "demobilised" member of ZANU-PF's youth militia, who declined to be identified, told IRIN that only the militia bases in urban areas were being dismantled.

"Some of my colleagues have relocated to rural areas to set up new bases or join existing ones. They have launched Operation Makazviitirei [Operation Why Did You Ever Vote for the MDC]," he said. This operation has been running since ZANU-PF lost the general elections on 29 March.

"On the eve of voting [in the presidential runoff on 27 June] we mobilised all the people to spend the night at an all-night vigil, so that they would go straight from the base to the polling station. Our base commander, a serving soldier who is a war veteran, was in charge, and the same appeared to be the case with other bases.
"Unfortunately, the lines of communication are so vague  that some of my colleagues, who had not been officially told to stop mobilising the people [in urban areas], have been severely beaten up by the police and army for political violence," he said.

The ruling party had ordered that political violence cease in urban areas, as it was difficult to hide such activities and exposed ZANU-PF to international criticism, the youth militia member said.

ZANU-PF has mobilised the three main pillars of the party: the Youth League, which also contains the Youth Brigade; the Women's League; and its Main Wing, comprised mainly of male ZANU-PF members.

The Youth Brigade has been wearing uniforms since the 1980s, but in 2000, after Mugabe launched the fast-track land reform programme to redistribute white commercial farmland to landless blacks, ZANU-PF established a National Youth Service. Its graduates - also known as the Green Bombers because they dress in green fatigues - combined with the Youth Brigade and are collectively called the ZANU-PF youth militia.

The militia recruits youth from the ranks of both the urban and rural unemployed and though they do not receive payment, they use their positions to force people to supply them with food and drink.

These young people fight against opposition activists and were responsible for rounding up and frog-marching people to "re-education and re-orientation bases", known as torture camps by the MDC, the youth militia member told IRIN.

He said youth militia were never accepted into the party hierarchy, as these positions were the preserve of "old men and women".

The militia bases were usually established in schools or clinics and were under the overall command of veterans of Zimbabwe's liberation war, or serving members of the army or security services, he said.

The youth militia member said all-night vigils were held, during which those brought to the bases were made to sing liberation songs and chant praises to Mugabe, and to publicly "confess" to being opposition members and then denounce the MDC.

IRIN 

A statement has been released by member states of the G8 expressing 'grave concern' over the current situation in Zimbabwe.

In the first section of the statement, the leaders wrote that they "deplore the fact that the Zimbabwean authorities pressed ahead with the presidential election despite the absence of appropriate conditions for free and fair voting as a result of their systematic violence, obstruction and intimidation." Furthermore, the G8 member nations noted that they do "not accept the legitimacy of any government that does not reflect the will of the Zimbabwean people."

The statement continued by asking for the opposition party Movement for Democratic Change to co-operate with ZANU-PF, the party in power. "We strongly urge the Zimbabwean authorities to work with the opposition to achieve a prompt, peaceful resolution of the crisis," they said. They did, add, however, that "it is important that any mediation process respect the results of the March 29, 2008 election. "

In addition, the G8 members expressed concern at the humanitarian situation in the coutry. "Zimbabwean authorities must allow the immediate resumption of humanitarian operations and full and non-discriminatory access to humanitarian assistance to prevent the suffering of the most vulnerable people in Zimbabwe."

The G8 summit is an annual gathering of the leaders of France, the United States, the United Kingdom, Russia, Germany, Japan, Italy and Canada. This year, the 34^th G8 summit took place in Hokkaidō, Japan.

Over 30 female contestants and leaders across all political parties recently participated in a consultation meeting to review the gender concerns in the last local government area council election, at Pakalinding Lodge, Lower River Region. The meeting validated the reports on the pre-election activities with potential female contestants and reviewed the participation of women in the 2008 Local Government elections.

In her remarks, the Executive Director of GAMCOTRAP Dr. Isatou Touray, emphasised that the project on women’s political participation is supported by the Open Society Initiative of West Africa – OSIWA. She said it is not about partisan politics but rather to create political awareness amongst women to empower them within their own parties. Dr. Touray called for unity of purpose, solidarity and trustworthiness in women’s struggles; and pointed out that, as women there are commonalities, specificities and difference but they should all work for the interests of all women no matter what their partisan inclination is.

Speaking to the participants, the first Gambian female elected Parliamentarian and also Consultant for women and political participation, Honourable Nyimasata Sanneh, informed the participants that GAMCOTRAP is interested in creating awareness on women’s rights and empowerment and they choose the rights target for their activities. She emphasised that it is critical to engage women in decision-making positions in promoting women’s rights in politics. GAMCOTRAP was commended for the initiative to engage women leaders from different parties across the country to revisit the interest of women in the political processes.

 However, the participants highlighted some of the challenges female contestants were faced with amongst which were the concern that women leaders are used for election of political representatives and not for the strategic interest of women; challenges in their parties select committees attitudes towards some of the female candidates, sexual harassment during the campaign period, lack of funding for female candidates to campaign and reluctance of elite women to contest for elections, among other things.

The participants recommended a sensitisation on the Local Government Act and the role of area councilors, to train women on leadership and other skills to enhance their knowledge on policies and laws affecting them, to sensitise young girls on reproductive health and rights.

 They finally called for a national forum across parties to discuss the gender concerns in vying for elections for the interests of all women and promote solidarity and positive campaign strategies within and across parties, whilst emphasising the need for women to be recognised in their own right as citizens and to work in solidarity.