LIBERIA: Transitional parliament finally adopts election bill

[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

MONROVIA, 15 Dec 2004 (IRIN) - After international pressure and a veto from Liberia's interim leader, the transitional parliament has finally ended five months of wrangling and removed a controversial amendment, to pass an electoral reform bill that paves the way for polls to take place on schedule in October 2005.

Parliament had already passed the bill in November, but it added an amendment which demanded a national census be conducted before the polls.

This prompted a threat from the US government, the country’s leading donor, to cut off vital aid for Liberia’s post-war reconstruction if the transitional authorities delayed the date of elections by organising a time-consuming census.

The head of the interim government Gyude Bryant refused to sign off on the bill and sent it back to parliament.
On Tuesday, the 76-member assembly, comprising representatives of the country’s three former armed groups, political parties and civil society, adopted a revised reform bill.

This time around, the assembly dropped its census demand, which some commentators said would have pushed elections back to 2008 from October 2005, the date set in stone in a peace agreement ending 14 years of war that was signed in August 2003.

The last census in the heavily-forested West African nation, set up by freed American slaves in the 19th century, dates back to 1984. It put the population at three million, but there are no reliable figures on the number of people who died in the civil war, or on how many of the 350,000 refugees who fled abroad have come home to vote.

Assembly speaker George Dweh insisted that the passing of the bill was unrelated to any outside pressure to stick to the terms of the peace deal.

“We did so in the interest of our people and not in the midst of any pressure,” Dweh said.

Fears that the transitional authorities were dragging their feet drew criticism not only from the US government but also from the United Nations, which has its largest peacekeeping force of 15,000 troops in Liberia.

US ambassador John Blaney a fortnight ago bluntly threatened to cut aid if parliament delayed the ballot.

"It is time to stop calling for census that would take three years to implement, and instead, start the ball rolling to return Liberia to democratically-elected government on schedule," Blaney said. "Precious time needed to prepare for elections is slipping away."

An aid freeze by Washington would have had a huge impact on Liberia's efforts to rebuild like repairing the nation's roads, improving schools and hospitals, reviving electricity and water supply networks, repatriating refugees and retraining former fighters. Since August 2003, US government aid to Liberia’s recovery program has amounted to US$ 523 million.

Under the electoral reform bill passed by the assembly on Tuesday, a system of absolute majority will be used to determine the outcome of presidential, senatorial and mayoral elections.

A new system, taking into account the population of the constituencies, will be introduced for the House of Representatives. Each of Liberia's 15 counties will have two of the 64 seats up for grabs and the remaining 34 will be re-distributed to counties according to the size of their population, which will be determined by voter registration.

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