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Boycott blow for Senegal poll
04/06/2007 07:12 - (SA)
Malick Rokhy Ba
Dakar - An unprecedented opposition boycott dealt a big blow to legislative elections held in Senegal on Sunday, with many voters refusing to cast ballots in a poll challenged as democratically flawed.
President Abdoulaye Wade's ruling Senegalese Democratic Party (PDS) looked set to win a new governing mandate with its coalition partners, but with a low turnout marring its legitimacy.
No official figures were immediately available for how many of the five million eligible voters cast ballots on Sunday.
But AFP correspondents and local media reported that polling stations were far emptier than for February presidential elections that gave Wade his second term and for the last parliamentary elections in 2001.
The 17-party opposition grouping behind the boycott estimated that only around five percent of the voters participated.
Wade, who turned 81 last Tuesday, dismissed the apparent success of the boycott as he cast his ballot in Dakar's Point E suburb.
"I see that there are a lot of people, as there were during the presidential election. I would like to think that the turnout will be considerable," he said.
But officers in some of the 12 000 polling stations open for the day did not appear to be overwhelmed. A few were seen napping on their chairs inside the empty, hot classrooms used as polling stations.
Babacar Senghor, an official at one of the polling stations, said: "There are not many people. I think the poll boycott is carrying the day."
The boycott was a first for this former French colony, long reputed as a model of democracy in Africa.
Opposition groups said they urged voters to stay away after Wade refused to meet their demands for electoral reforms.
Among the changes they were looking for was an updating of voter lists and the creation of an independent structure to replace the government-appointed electoral commission to ensure poll transparency.
Most heavyweight opposition figures were absent from the ballot papers, including former prime minister Idrissa Seck and Ousmane Tanor Dieng of the former ruling Socialist Party, who came second and third respectively in the presidential elections.
There were still some 4 000 candidates who vied for the 150 seats in the new and enlarged national assembly.
Wade's PDS enjoyed a comfortable majority in the smaller outgoing parliament, holding 90 of the 120 seats.
The legislative polls had been postponed twice. The last delay, which forced authorities to drop plans to have it held concurrently with the presidential election, came after opposition allegations of "irregularities" of seat allocation.
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