Sudan’s CPA hinges on 2010 election say researchers

May 4, 2009 (WASHINGTON) – The very survival of Sudan’s landmark 2005 peace treaty (the CPA) hinges on the credibility of the country’s now-delayed elections, suggests a report by the UK and Kenya-based Rift Valley Institute.

Commissioned by the international development arm of the United Kingdom, the report claims that Sudan’s treaty-mandated elections, now set for February 2010, are in jeopardy due to the potential for malpractice, manipulation of the press and exclusion of voters living beyond the central area of the country.

“The stakes are very high. If the election should lack credibility, it is hard to see how the Comprehensive Peace Agreement can survive,” argues the report.

“Recent experience in Kenya has shown how a combination of failure of process and suspicion of malpractice can lead to a rapid loss of public confidence in the whole electoral procedure, with immediate violent consequences,” it notes.

For the 2010 election to be legitimate it must “ensure popular participation” and “overcome popular scepticism,” says the report.

In order to do this, “the coming election must be organized in ways that are, first, seen to be transparent and, second, ensure the inclusion of all kinds of voters in all regions,” say the authors in what they call their key recommendation of the entire 70-page report.

The authors do not elaborate on how the latter part of this “key recommendation” could be implemented in certain regions, making no reference to holding of the upcoming elections in Darfur. Even so, the report recommends international support for voter education in “all areas of the country.”

However, the stated aim of the authors was not to make recommendations but to supply election workers with “some sense of historical context, in the hope that this would help in the formidable task of preparing for elections.”

Thus most of the report is dedicated to background political history and history of the election process. To complete this research the authors reviewed records in Khartoum and Juba and interviewed 34 people involved in past Sudanese elections.

The authors of the report are historian Justin Wills of University of Durham, political scientist Atta el-Battahani of University of Khartoum, and political scientist Peter Woodward of University of Reading.

(ST)