Ethiopia elections body says 55 political parties to participate in May poll

ADDIS ABABA, Feb 25, 2005 (ENA) — The National Electoral Board of Ethiopia (NEBE) says 55 political parties would be contesting in the upcoming national elections scheduled to be held in May 2005.

Initiative Africa, a civic organization, on its part says it would publicize candidature symbols in the form of posters.

Existing and new political parties have been certified to run for the elections, acting registrar of political party registration office with the board, Mekonen Wondimu told Ethiopian News Agency on Friday.

He said 27 regional and national political parties have fielded candidates for the May 2005 elections. Some 31 parties have received 67 candidature symbols to run for seats in the House of Peoples Representatives and Regional Council, he said.

He said the contending political parties and candidates have already begun election campaigning via the mass media and various other platforms. Initiative Africa, a civic organization, has requested the board to support the campaigning activity, the acting registrar said. The organization has announced plan to print posters bearing candidature symbols in a bid to enable the general public know the competing parties, Wondimu said.

He said the board would permit the organization to undertake the activity on condition that it would publicize the symbols of all political parties impartiality.

The board would facilitate conditions to enable the organization get candidature symbols of all political parties, he said.

Wondimu said 17 new candidature symbols have been submitted to the board by the political parties.