ECOWAS experts to assess Guinean electoral register
Conakry, Guinea (PANA) - A technical mission of three experts from the Economic Commission of West African States (ECOWAS) is expected on Tuesday in Conakry, to participate in the audit of the electoral register with the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), according to sources.
This is a technical assistance mission of the experts in electoral register auditing, which will run until 13 March.
Observers from the ECOWAS and the African Union (AU) were called back to Guinea last week, shortly after the International Organization of the Francophonie (OIF) withdrew from the Guinean electoral process because of the existence, according to its experts, of more 2.5 million fictitious voters on the register.
These different institutions requested and obtained the postponement of the election of parliamentarians and a referendum both of which were scheduled for last Sunday.
With 72 hours to go before the votes, President Alpha Condé announced in a radio and television message "a slight postponement" for two weeks, in order to allow experts of ECOWAS and the AU, to which Guinea belongs, to check the INEC software, which he described as "efficient and indisputable".
President Condé said that the votes will only concern the 33 political parties that have submitted files accepted by the INEC.
The announced postponement of the votes was welcomed by several observers.
Meanwhile, the National Front for the Defence of the Constitution (FNDC), which has been organising street protests since last October to demand the cancellation of the referendum on the constitution, has asked its supporters to turn out in their numbers on Thursday in Conakry and other cities for street protests.
This time, they are demanding the departure of President Condé from power, as his second and last five-year term, according to the constitution promulgated in 2010, ends next October.
The majority of opposition parties decided to boycott the parliamentary election, arguing that the voters' list is "corrupt" and that FNDC is determined to prevent the vote by all means.
The parliamentary election was initially to be held on 28 December and then postponed to 16 February, before another decree of the head of state, coupling this vote to the constitutional referendum, was scheduled for last Sunday.
-0- PANA AC/JSG/BBA/MA 3March2020
