In Mali, Prime Minister Choguel Maïga officially confirmed on Thursday, July 8, his plan to set up a single electoral body with a view to the future presidential election, which will end the transition period next February. But this project raises many questions about its implementation. In a guidance note commissioned by Choguel Maïga, several experts gave their recommendations.
This project to set up a single electoral body has long been called for by many political parties in Malia and by civil society organizations. We remember that it was especially the challenge of the last election that triggered the wave of protests against President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta, which was finally overthrown by the coup on August 18, but it was precisely after this coup. And in the current context of transition, as many fear it this structure is installed in a hurry, or vice versa, that it serves as an excuse to extend the transition period. Many also fear that the military will try to control this unique structure more easily.
To date, elections in Malia fall under three different structures, specific to West Africa and even on the continent. The Ministry of Territorial Administration, which physically organizes the vote and proclaims the results then validated by the Constitutional Court, the General Electoral Delegation, an independent electoral register structure, electoral cards and public funding parties, and the independent National Electoral Commission, Céni, a “gendarme” that controls the vote and issues opinions to the Ministry of Administration when it observes deficiencies and makes its own vote count, in parallel with the Ministry’s.
An independent body
In a briefing commissioned by Prime Minister Choguel Maïga last month, several experts – a researcher, a judge, an observer of civil society and a former president of Ceni – recommend that the powers of the Ministry of Territorial Administration, which they say are neutral “, is simply transferred to the new independent body. A kind of new Ceni with expanded powers. The General Electoral Delegation would become a technical service with its leaders forbidden to exercise any political or administrative function and to have a private business.
To guarantee its independence, Malian experts recommend that the new body be composed at national level of 15 members, appointed by the political parties “after an even distribution between the parties”, by civil society organizations specializing in elections and, ia to to a lesser extent representatives of religious denominations and organizations of judges, lawyers, human rights defenders and women’s associations. The president of the new structure would thus necessarily come from civil society.
Experts suggest “that the electoral body can have its source at the level of the constitution” to strengthen its legitimacy. The “big challenge”, finally note the authors of this guidance note, will be to implement these changes within the deadline set for the transition period.
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