quarta-feira, julho 01, 2009

Que pretendia a Renamo com a revisão pontual da lei eleitoral? (1)

Leia o que o AWEPA escreveu (em inglês)no seu Boletin 40, sobre o conteúdo das propostas da Renamo e depois a carta (em português) de Viana Magalhães, chefe da bancada da Renamo ao Presidente da Assembleia da República.

Renamo calls for urgent law changes

Detailed proposals to amend the electoral law to deal with specific problems which occurred in the 19 November 2008 local elections have been tabled by Renamo, following the rejection by Frelimo of broader suggestions. The request for urgent action was submitted to parliament on 23 June by the head of the Renamo parliamentary group, Viana Magalhães. The proposals deal with spoiling of ballot papers, ballot box stuffing, police presence, and party delegates.

In his letter, Magalhães says that Renamo submitted its first proposals on 12 January and they were not even considered by a parliamentary commission until May, leaving very little time before the 28 October election.
Although the local elections were generally well run, there were problems in Ilha de Moçambique and elsewhere of polling station staff using the indelible ink to put extra ink marks on significant numbers of ballot papers for Renamo, invalidating them by showing that voters had allegedly voted improperly for two candidates. Renamo proposes an amendment to the law requiring that all ink and ink pads be removed from the polling station before the count, and that there should be checks to ensure polling station staff do not have ink on their fingers.
Renamo has been concerned with ballot box stuffing. In November there were reports of extra ballot papers in ballot boxes, and Renamo accused Frelimo of bringing in ballot papers from outside the polling station. Ballot papers come in books, and Renamo proposes the ballot papers and their stubs be numbered. If there are more ballot papers in the box than people who voted, polling station staff should compare the numbers on ballot papers with the stubs, and exclude those ballot papers which do not come from the book of blank ballots supplied to the polling station. It would also tighten rules to ensure only as many ballot papers are printed as there are registered voters.
There were problems of police being less than 300 metres from polling stations, and in a few cases even being at the door of polling stations and helping organise queues. Although this was already a violation of the law, Renamo proposes a number of minor changes to tighten this rule.
Each party is allowed a party delegate (monitor) and an alternate in each polling station. Renamo proposes to change this to allow a pair for each “election”. There will be three elections and three ballot papers, which would allow three delegates and three alternates in each polling station.
Finally, Renamo proposes two changes to the district level count. Under the present law, the district election commission adds up the votes from all polling stations in the district, based on the results sheets (editais) and more detailed minutes, and other relevant material – which in principle allows recounts. Renamo would remove this possibility, and force district election commissions to only use editais and minutes. At the polling station, party delegates and observers are given official copies of the editais; these may be used at district level if there is a problem, in particular with missing editais as has happened in the past. Renamo would change this to force the district election commission to use these official copies if the original is missing.
By Monday afternoon 29 June, the parliament’s speaker Dr Eduardo Mulémbwè, had not responded to the Magalhães letter.

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