ADDIS ABABA – Voting polls closed at 6 PM around the country
amidst charges of serious irregularities by main opposition
groups. The charges are being investigated by foreign observers. While
voting was largely peaceful and uneventful in Addis, reports of
irregularities reached opposition offices in Addis from the regions as
early as 8 AM local time. Reports of voters and observers being turned away; and
pre-marked ballot papers being found in polling stations has marred
the credibility of the outcome of the election.
Polling stations were mostly devoid of people after two in the
afternoon in Addis. “ Most people voted in the morning. Almost 80- 90
percent in our case,” said a polling station chief to foreign
reporters. “The electoral process is impeccable.” And none of the
long lines that was reported by AFP was evident in the polling
stations that I visited in Addis with foreign journalists either in
the morning or afternoon. Neither did the many people we talked with
complain of long lines. “There hasn’t been a repeat of the long lines
we saw in 2005. There is low expectation about this election and the
absence of long lines is a reflection of that sentiment,” says a
pundit who went to his polling station quite early to cast his vote.
Scores of people refused to tell foreign reporters whom they voted for
as kebele officials unabashedly eavesdropped on the interviews around
Addis. One middle class couple we met outside a polling station in
Bole secretly confided that they had voted for Medrek, but admitted
that they were worried about the huge number of women and youth
“bribed to give their vote to the EPRDF.” And were even more
pessimistic about the opposition’s prospects. “They will not let them
win. This is not about what the people want.”
But others were less circumspect. “I voted for the EPRDF,” said one of
the many sympathizes of the EPRDF who showed no qualms about revealing
their choices. And why did you vote for it, we ask. “Because I want
peace,” he replied rather energetically.
“Does this mean that their will be no peace if the opposition wins, he
was asked. Confused and flabbergasted, he walks away without really
explaining himself.
Polling officials we talked with said that counting will start as soon
as polls are closed. “We will paste the results tomorrow morning for
all to see. We will also notify the results to the electoral board.
And it should be able to release provisional results as of tomorrow,”
told us a polling station chief in Bole late afternoon.
First Update
Voting started as early as 7AM this morning in Ethiopia’s more than
44,000 polling stations. I visited polling stations in Addis this
morning as a translator for foreign journalists. Our first sojourn in
Wereda 12, which was Birtukan Medeksa’s neighborhood before her
imprisonment, where a heated argument between Medrek’s candidate in
the area, Baheta Taddssse, and what his supporters said was a federal
police in civilian cloth briefly threatened to escalate into a scuffle.
Baheta, who was being visibly harassed by a kekbele official, was
confronted by the alleged federal police in civilian cloth as he came
out of a polling station after casting his vote. “Don’t we have rights
like you do?” screamed an agitated Bahta to a woman (a kebele
official) in her 40s as she took pictures of him on her mobile phone.
The police, who were standing a few meters away, did not intervene.
The long lines at polling stations seems to be of a bygone era, as no
more than 20-30 people stood at a time in line to cast their vote. “
There are no lines because we have more polling stations this year,”
said a polling station chief when asked if the turnout is less than it
was in 2005. “People are coming out to vote. For example, of the 1000
people registered to vote here, 500 have done so and its only 10: 30
in the morning.” But even with the new polling stations part of the
equation, the turnout seemed underwhelming to most of the people we
interviewed. “ The lines were long by 7 AM in the morning in
2005.Where are half of those people?”asked one young man whom we
talked with as he came out of a polling station. And why does he think
there are less people, we ask. “ There is less enthusiasm this year,”
he replies, his eyes fixed on an obvious government emissary who
stood nearby listening to everything that was being said. Can you tell
us whom you voted for, we ask. He politely declines, still eyeing the
person who was standing nearby. But another young man was more
forceful. “ I voted for Medrek, and so will most people. I have no
question that Medrek will win,” he said, not in the least intimidated
by kebele informants that we all knew that were standing nearby.So you
think change will come, we inquired. “ No,” he responded seriously.
And why not? “No will be able to assure fair tallying of the votes.”
One of the foreign journalists with me was intrigued, and wanted to
know why he would bother to vote if he has no confidence in the
process. “ Because it’s better than doing nothing.”
In each polling station that we visited, five election observers,
notionally independent but distrusted by the opposition, sat visibly
in the middle of the room, while political parties’ representatives
sat a few meters from them, almost all of them with a pen and paper in
hand silently taking notes. In some polling stations not all
representatives of political parties were present, though we were to
find out later that none have been turned back in Addis. “I just got
here and no one was here from my party,” told us one of them. “ I am
accredited to observe in different precincts, so I sat down.” Did you
observe any problem, we ask. “No,” he replies, much to the delight of
the EPRDF representative sitting next to him.
But the reports coming out of the regions were really alarming. In
Tigary, where Seye is running, election observers have been overtly
intimidated; in one instance the police fired in the air to frighten
them. Some had been arrested and released after few hours. “All we
worked for is on the verge of being lost,”said Seye to foreign
journalists by phone. In the Amhara and Oromo regions the opposition
complained of scores of voters were being turned away from polling
stations, and their observers being denied access to polling stations.
The head of the EU observer’s mission, who spoke to reporters at 11 in
one of the polling stations in Addis, acknowledged that he had
received allegations of irregularities, but deferred from passing
judgment at such an early stage.
