NEC suspends electoral process in Unity state’s Parieng as Angelina leads
April 20, 2010 (JUBA) – The electoral body overseeing the conduct of the Sudan’s general elections has issued a decision to partially suspend the electoral process in one of Unity state’s nine counties following some serious irregularities in some of its constituencies.
The National Elections Commission (NEC) on Monday afternoon announced the decision to exclude a number of areas in Parieng County from the ongoing process for executive and parliamentary elections, pending investigations into such irregularities.
Earlier, a number of candidates contesting for the gubernatorial position in the state, led by Angelina Teny, and other parties’ agents filed a petition to the electoral body, accusing the county officials of blocking their agents from participating in the monitoring of the polling and during the sorting and counting of votes at the polling stations.
According to an official source close to NEC, it was also discovered that the county’s electoral staff illegally continued with polling for extra two days.
He said the illegal process continued even after the polling was officially closed on Thursday last week, making the county’s polling days seven in number.
As a result, the process was detected to have involved massive fraud in the county which was seen as the last battle ground for the two main rivals, incumbent governor Taban Deng Gai and independent candidate, Angelina Teny.
The State High Elections Committee has received the overall results from the rest of the eight counties, showing Teny leading the gubernatorial race by a wide margin.
The county officials were also suspected of manipulating the process in favor of the incumbent state governor, though the votes from the least populated Parieng, estimated to have less than 10,000 registered voters, would not narrow the wide gap as results from the other eight counties revealed that Teny was ahead of Gai by more than 24,000 votes cast.
NEC’s decision for partial suspension of the electoral process in the area was publicly announced over radio Omdurman at 3PM on Monday after communicating the decision to its branch office in Southern Sudan.
The official further added that the next move would be for all parties’ agents to participate in verification of figures on Tuesday during which results from the eight counties would be entered into computer system before submitting them to NEC office for official announcement.
After completion of the verification of the figures, the candidates or their agents would then sign for the final results as an approval for official declaration.
Angelina Teny, the wife of Southern Sudan’s Vice President, Dr. Riek Machar Teny, has also been the state minister of Energy and Mining in the Khartoum-based Government of National Unity for the last five years.
Disowned by her party, the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) after declaring her independent candidature, Teny in her manifesto explained that she was responding to “public outcry for a new leader in the state…and to save the office from falling into the hands of a different political party as the popularity of the current governor severely dwindled throughout the state.”
Educated in Great Britain after completing her secondary school in Khartoum, the 40+ years old gubernatorial contestant criticized the current state administration for failure to provide development services to the people for the last five years despite the presence of resources, which she described as “astonishing experience to every citizen of Unity state.”
Five candidates including Teny are contesting for the position of governor in the Sudan’s oil-rich state.
(ST)