The Recommendations are repeated below:


The Commission recommends that appropriate amendments be made to Sections
65 and 72 of the Elections Decree 1996.




Section 65 States that polls during elections should commence at 7 a.m.
and close at 6 p.m. In the last 5 elections (Sami Chieftaincy Election,
Central Baddibu and Kiang East by-elections, Presidential Elections,
National Assembly and Local Government Elections) the Commission has
brought forward the closing time to 4 p.m. to allow enough light for the
counting of votes. The commission has also consequently reduced the
number of voters per polling station from 1,000 to not more than 800.
With this arrangement, in most polling stations voting ended well before
4 p.m. Section 72 Makes it mandatory for ballot boxes to be transported
to designated counting centres which appears to exclude the possibility
of counting on the spot. The Commission recommends that this Section be
re-written to Allow the possibility of counting on the spot.


It is recommended the National Assembly enact legislation to allow the
IEC to de-register political parties that are inactive. Enough and
appropriate vehicles must be provided to ensure successful conduct of all
electoral activities in The Gambia. Lack of provision of vehicles would
reduce the Commission’s capacity to conduct elections. The provision of
suitable and enough permanent physical facilities for the Commission is
an urgent need. Some of the buildings currently being used as the
Commission’s regional offices are old, dilapidated and temporary. The
Commission attached to its last Report the architect’s drawings for the
Commission’s headquarters and regional offices. It is recommended that
the National Assembly supports its search for and the provision of funds
for its building programme. Please note that on 28 October 2002, IEC
submitted to GAMWORKS an appropriate project document to seek funding and
support from our donor partners. The support of the National Assembly is
being sought to expedite the process. It is recommended that greater
powers be given to the IEC to enforce Campaign Ethics The IEC recognizes
the need to enforce the campaign Code of Ethics and ensure that all
parties comply with the regulations set out to promote peace, tolerance
and orderliness, during the electoral process. During campaign periods,
the IEC through budgeting should be allowed to cater for the hiring of
independent monitors to monitor political party rallies and other
meetings. The monitors will readily provide independent information to
the IEC in the event of any breach of campaign ethics by any political
party.



IEC Advocates the Introduction of Proportional Representation into the
Electoral System


Since democracy at the national level is about representation of the
people, the voice of minority groups need to be considered and taken
onboard. It has been noticed while on election observation mission in the
sub-region and elsewhere, that there is growing tendency for electoral
systems in place to opt for ‘Proportional Representation’ in order to
ensure that allocation of parliamentary seats encourages diversity of
political opinion in Parliament or the National Assembly. The IEC
therefore recommends that the electoral system in The Gambia be tailored
to adopt the proportional representation system rather than the ‘first
past the post’ as is currently the case in The Gambia. IEC feels the
Elections Decree should be transformed into an Act.
The participation of the IEC in regional and sub-regional election
observation missions should be encouraged as much as possible to broaden
the horizon in the delivery of election services and acquisition of ‘best
practices’ in election administration and management. As international
organizing bodies do not cover funding in some cases, the IEC finds
itself incapable to take part in election observations missions in the
sub-region. Where absolutely necessary, Government should assist. The IEC
recommends that the National Assembly urgently passes an Act to replace
the Elections decree, 1996, which was transitional electoral document,
with an ‘Elections Act’.  Comments: The Constitution does make provision
for the financial independence of the IEC from the executive. Section 44
states, "The Independent Electoral Commission shall submit its annual
estimates of expenditure to the President for presentation to the
National Assembly in accordance with this Constitution. The President
shall cause the estimates to be placed before the National Assembly
without amendment, but may attach to them his/her own comments and
observations." In short, the IEC is mandated to prepare its budget and
forward it to the President who has no right to tamper with it and is
obliged to forward it with or without his comments to the National
Assembly. If the IEC takes advantage of this provision it would go a long
way in meeting its financial needs. In other words they need not appeal
to the executive to provide transport for them. If they see an urgent
need for it they should simply include it in their estimate and check the
estimate submitted to the National Assembly to ensure that the executive
has not tampered with it. This financial independence is necessary for
the IEC as a safeguard against financial arm-twisting by the executive.
Representation of the people is a cardinal component of good governance,
which must be taken seriously by all concerned. Hence adequate facilities
must be provided for the IEC to do their work. If the IEC sees the need
to build offices to facilitate its work and it cannot tap external funds,
it should simply include it in its estimate and stop complaining.

 
Issue No. 13/ 2004, 12-15 February, 2004

EDITORIAL

Inflation Continues To Bite
President Jammeh Continues To Pretend

Inflation continues to bite deep into the pockets of most Gambians who
are finding it increasingly difficult to meet their vital needs for
survival. Instead of acknowledging that the present economic crisis is a
consequence of the failed economic policies pursued by his regime,
President Jammeh puts the blame squarely on unscrupulous businesspersons
(including retailers) for selling at exorbitant prices. Based on this
premise he launched "Operation No Compromise" purportedly to control
prices, among other things by taking a militarist approach. Recent days
have witnessed hikes in the prices of flour, bread, palm oil and other
items. The price hikes are often accompanied by scarcity. The attempt to
force down the prices of essential commodities or locally produced
commodities has not worked. On the contrary, it often leads to scarcity.
Arrests or threats by the police or other authorities over even vigilante
groups often scare off retailers from their market stalls. Some stop
trading in that commodity while others hoard. The end result is scarcity
and increased hardship. For example on Wednesday, when our reporter
visited various markets she could find no palm oil because vendors were
scared to sell it at D14 or D15 per cup. The attempt to force butchers to
sell meat at D35-40 has failed. Now, meat is being sold at D60-70. A bag
of rice is now D420. A breadwinner buys a bag of rice and spends D25 per
day or D750 per month for breakfast, fish and ingredients could require
D1170 just to feed his/her family, excluding rent, medication, schooling,
etc. This exceeds the monthly income of most employees. The consequence
of this is poor diet and malnutrition. There is need to come up with a
policy that would revitalize the ailing economy and to enable us to have
three square meals a day and improve their livelihood generally.
President Jammeh’s regime relies on the private sector to revitalize the
economy. But the private sector does not find it profitable and has not
significantly invested in the productive sector. Thus in the year 2003,
imports exceeded D4 billion while exports were less than D100 million.
This has impacted on foreign exchange rates and prices. What alternative
has President Jammeh, given that prices of imported commodities cannot be
reduced as long as the world market prices remain the same and the
exchange rate of the dalasi continues to depreciate or even remain
stagnant? In the face of his failed economic policies President Jammeh
must stop pretending. If he really wants to control prices he can simply
present a Bill at the National Assembly to empower him to force the
vendors to sell at controlled prices. In light of his inability to give
fresh life to the economy, what is prudent is for him to compromise or
dialogue with the business community to ensure reasonable prices and
availability of commodities. "Operation No Compromise" is only leading us
to continued inflation, scarcity and repression.

The Last Part Of Sidia’s Input On The Budget 2004.

Development Cannot Take Place In A Fettered Situation! Says Sidia
On The Bamako Initiative

My contention about the Bamako Initiative is that, it is the people who
pay tax, so there is nothing like free service. No government is giving
free service anywhere because all that government is doing is money
generated by the people, so it is not free. I’m saying that the people
pay taxes for these services to be given to them, yet you ask them to dip
their hands into their pockets and buy this and that. Then what about the
money they have provided for that service? If you want the people to
assume the responsibility of owning their health centres, then you must
give them the money they provided for the services to be done. If you
fail to do that, then I am not in agreement. That’s why all the attempts
to implement "The Bamako Initiative" has been a fiasco. They attempted it
in Bajakunda and one man said he was not going to pay D10. In the first
place, even if it is going to take place, there should be a legal
framework within which it will operate. You cannot just ask!
the people to assume their responsibility and then start imposing money
on them without a legal framework, it is impossible! People must assume
their responsibilities, yes, but the people must not be only given
political power but also economic power to do it. If you do it that way,
then it will work.
To wind up Mr. Speaker, as I said in the beginning, development is a
process and it is a collective enterprise. We, who are citizens of the
Republic, we who are Members of this National Assembly have a crucial
role to play because it is our responsibility to scrutinize every butut
that is injected into this development fund. Be it a project, a loan, or
whatever. That is our responsibility and that is why we have a project
monitoring committee in this National Assembly, which is also doing its
job. It is only once that they have gone round to see projects. So the
committee must assume that responsibility to begin to monitor all these
projects, particularly the loans we have approved for projects. We must
follow them and see what is happening so that next time, when a loan is
brought here for a project, we know what to say and what to do. Mr.
Speaker, development cannot take place in a fettered situation. People
must be free, they must have their freedom to talk and to act. People
must have their freedom to talk not negatively but to express their views
about everything that is going on in this country. It is my right to
express my view about everything in this country and if I can make a
contribution to make a change, I’ll make it. But I should not be fettered
and my voice should not be muffled by anybody. If we do that, then the
type of democracy that you talked about cannot come about. But as long as
the people have fear to do things or even to think of to say what they
think, then there is a problem. The media is there for all of us and the
constitution is very clear on that. All the views must be represented on
the media. This is the only way forward. After all we are all Gambians.
There is no Gambian however evil he/she maybe, who wishes evil for this
Republic. We are all in the same house and we wan! t this house to be
good. But we must tighten our belts. The honesty and frankness with which
this budget is presented, that honesty and frankness must continue so
that we can be able to deal with the crucial problems that the Secretary
of State for Finance and Economic Affairs talked about. THE END

_________________________________________________________________
Store more e-mails with MSN Hotmail Extra Storage – 4 plans to choose from!
http://click.atdmt.com/AVE/go/onm00200362ave/direct/01/

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
To Search in the Gambia-L archives, go to: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/CGI/wa.exe?S1=gambia-l
To contact the List Management, please send an e-mail to:
[log in to unmask]

To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface
at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~