The Election
The presidential election took place last week. I spent the day primarily playing on the computer, but I took a few looks around town to see what was happening.
I was expecting some excitement on election day, although I was pretty sure the president was going to be re-elected when all was said and done. In Guinea, our neighbor to the south, all volunteers had to be evacuated because the government declared a state of siege after the trade unions shut down the whole country. Senegal is not Guinea, but there were signs that something could happen. A top candidate was released from prison a few months before the election and looks to be headed back there. A couple nights before the election I was walking through the center of town buying a sandwich when I saw a crowd of about fifteen people yelling at another crowd. The crowd were side by side, with the main arguers from each respective group poised at the forefront. Eventually, they started pushing each other, and the epicenter of the two groups started to shift at a slow step. I walked back to my place.
Also, there were commercials during the weeks preceding the election warning people against attacking agents of the press. It’s a bit odd seeing something of this nature on TV, as if it protecting journalists were just as typical an exercise as using a mosquito net or wearing a seat belt.
On my walks around town days before I noticed lines of people around the municipal center. I asked my supervisor what they were for, and he said they were people waiting to pick up their national ID cards and voter registration cards. “Why are they picking up their cards so late?” I inquired. “Ca c’est le sous-developpement,” he replied.
I walked around town again on election day. The mayor’s office, my first and most obvious stop, was empty. I then saw a big line at the women’s center and investigated. I walked around it and discovered it to be another pickup point for ID cards. About a hundred people were camped outside, more than I had seen on any previous day. Every minute the proctors read off a pair of names and two people walked inside. A few more showed up in line.
In the evening I went to the prefecture for the rural community. There I saw a sea of hundreds of people all clustered around the door. The people had formed a very precise semi-circle around it. The invisible barrier that guided them was a ring marked in chalk and a group of gendarmes with rifles standing in the center. Again I asked what people were doing here. It was another pickup point for ID cards and voter registration cards. The throng waiting somewhat patiently. I came and left the scene, an hour before the polls were to close.
Finally, I found a polling place. It was at the grade school near my house, much as it would be in the states. There I saw no one waiting in line. Four rooms were open. A few people were waiting outside, and each had a half-dozen staffing the proceedings. Each room contained a ballot box and a voting booth with a curtain. Nothing hectic, nothing out of the ordinary. A gendarme with a rifle was taking a nap under a tree.
The system of voting is much more straightforward in Senegal than in America. There is only one position to vote for. Each candidate has his picture and political party identification on a sheet of colored paper. The voter simply has to choose his candidate, put it in an envelope, and stick that envelope in the ballot box.
Of the fifteen candidates in the election, only four had any real following. I’d be surprised if the final eleven candidates got more than ten thousand votes among them. Candidates advertised themselves the same way that everything is advertised here, whether it be a baptism or a new brand of margarine. Groups of supporters in caravans drove around towns with loud speakers screaming campaign slogans from their SUVs. Rallies were held as well, although, again, they could have been confused for a wedding or a baptism were the scale and the tone not slightly different. People came to the public square. They listened to music at a volume too loud for comfort. The drummers drummed, and the people sat around in plastic chairs until it was over.
Election results were read on the radio as they came in from polling places. No percentages were tallied; rather candidates’ raw number of votes were read off in order, much as they were during the pre-TV age in the States. People listened to their radios through the night, and the next day the result was clear. The president won in the first round with 55% of the popular vote. The election was free and fair, and there were no accusations of fraud. There was no grand change, no revolt, no violence- just a bit of excitement and a lot of noise. In other words, it happened just like everything else does here.
I was expecting some excitement on election day, although I was pretty sure the president was going to be re-elected when all was said and done. In Guinea, our neighbor to the south, all volunteers had to be evacuated because the government declared a state of siege after the trade unions shut down the whole country. Senegal is not Guinea, but there were signs that something could happen. A top candidate was released from prison a few months before the election and looks to be headed back there. A couple nights before the election I was walking through the center of town buying a sandwich when I saw a crowd of about fifteen people yelling at another crowd. The crowd were side by side, with the main arguers from each respective group poised at the forefront. Eventually, they started pushing each other, and the epicenter of the two groups started to shift at a slow step. I walked back to my place.
Also, there were commercials during the weeks preceding the election warning people against attacking agents of the press. It’s a bit odd seeing something of this nature on TV, as if it protecting journalists were just as typical an exercise as using a mosquito net or wearing a seat belt.
On my walks around town days before I noticed lines of people around the municipal center. I asked my supervisor what they were for, and he said they were people waiting to pick up their national ID cards and voter registration cards. “Why are they picking up their cards so late?” I inquired. “Ca c’est le sous-developpement,” he replied.
I walked around town again on election day. The mayor’s office, my first and most obvious stop, was empty. I then saw a big line at the women’s center and investigated. I walked around it and discovered it to be another pickup point for ID cards. About a hundred people were camped outside, more than I had seen on any previous day. Every minute the proctors read off a pair of names and two people walked inside. A few more showed up in line.
In the evening I went to the prefecture for the rural community. There I saw a sea of hundreds of people all clustered around the door. The people had formed a very precise semi-circle around it. The invisible barrier that guided them was a ring marked in chalk and a group of gendarmes with rifles standing in the center. Again I asked what people were doing here. It was another pickup point for ID cards and voter registration cards. The throng waiting somewhat patiently. I came and left the scene, an hour before the polls were to close.
Finally, I found a polling place. It was at the grade school near my house, much as it would be in the states. There I saw no one waiting in line. Four rooms were open. A few people were waiting outside, and each had a half-dozen staffing the proceedings. Each room contained a ballot box and a voting booth with a curtain. Nothing hectic, nothing out of the ordinary. A gendarme with a rifle was taking a nap under a tree.
The system of voting is much more straightforward in Senegal than in America. There is only one position to vote for. Each candidate has his picture and political party identification on a sheet of colored paper. The voter simply has to choose his candidate, put it in an envelope, and stick that envelope in the ballot box.
Of the fifteen candidates in the election, only four had any real following. I’d be surprised if the final eleven candidates got more than ten thousand votes among them. Candidates advertised themselves the same way that everything is advertised here, whether it be a baptism or a new brand of margarine. Groups of supporters in caravans drove around towns with loud speakers screaming campaign slogans from their SUVs. Rallies were held as well, although, again, they could have been confused for a wedding or a baptism were the scale and the tone not slightly different. People came to the public square. They listened to music at a volume too loud for comfort. The drummers drummed, and the people sat around in plastic chairs until it was over.
Election results were read on the radio as they came in from polling places. No percentages were tallied; rather candidates’ raw number of votes were read off in order, much as they were during the pre-TV age in the States. People listened to their radios through the night, and the next day the result was clear. The president won in the first round with 55% of the popular vote. The election was free and fair, and there were no accusations of fraud. There was no grand change, no revolt, no violence- just a bit of excitement and a lot of noise. In other words, it happened just like everything else does here.
posted by Unknown at 6:18 AM
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