Rwanda
Rwanda prepares for its first municipal elections

afrol.com, 8 January - Only shortly after the Rwandan Electoral Commission confirmed the election dates as being 6, 7 and 8 March 2001, registration of voters began. Government postponed the elections, which are seen as a precursor to presidential and parliamentary elections in 2003 or 2004, three time, awaiting foreign funds for the exercise. 

Speaking to the press on Thursday, the President of the Electoral Commission, Mr. Protais Musoni announced the final election dates and that voter registration would last for four days, while registration of candidates will begin 8 January and end 19 January 2001. Later, Mr. Musoni however has proposed to prolong the voter registration until 15 January, to admit latecomers. Publication of the final lists of candidates will follow 15 February.

Mr. Musoni urged Rwandans to actively participate in the elections, from the point of registration to election day itself. He assured Rwandans that the entire process would be conducted transparently. "The electoral commission intends and is committed to making sure the elections are peaceful, free and fair," Mr. Musoni said. 

A number of posts will be open for election during the forthcoming elections, including posts for women and the youth representatives to the Management Committees of the country's city Councils, the Rwandan Government confirms. The Government estimates that up to 4 million voters will take part in the elections. The poll is expected to produce about one hundred Mayors, independent of any political affiliation, according to news agencies.

As the election exercise will cost US$ 5 million, funding was connected to the declaration of the election dates. Rwandan Government managed to cut a deal where half of the funding will come from the Government itself and the rest from its main development partners, taking interest in the democratisation process. The US, UK, Belgian, German and Dutch Governments have so far provided support for the election, according to Rwandan Government sources. 

The "Commune Elections" are part of the democratization process that was started by the so-called Government of National Unity, headed by President Paul Kagame. Local elections are the first of its kind in post-war and post-genocide Rwanda. The democratization process is planned to culminate in general and presidential elections once a new constitution has been drafted and ratified by the people in a referendum. 

The most disputed issue in the voters registration has been the participation of foreigners in Rwanda and of Rwandan refugees abroad. The President of the Electoral Commission, Mr. Protais Musoni, has informed that foreigners living in Rwanda for more than one year may register as voters, being few in numbers but welcomed to participate in the "development of the local governments". They are however not eligible.

Rwandans living abroad, as emigrants or refugees, are not allowed to register, as is common in local elections world-wide. The problem of refugee participation is however believed to become more disputed in the forthcoming referendums, parliamentarian elections and presidential election, as much of the Government's fiercest opposition is found in exile.

The larger bulk of Rwandan refugees, most fleeing in connection with the 1994 genocide, have however already returned to Rwanda. By January this year, it has been calculated that some 60,000 refugees have kept "trickling back home" only the last two years. Most returnees come from refugee camps in neighbouring Tanzania, Burundi and Uganda and represent "normal" civilians.

Source: Based on afrol archives and Rwandan Government

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