Ethiopian ruling party leads across country: partial results
Election officials close the last ballot box in front of journalists at a polling
station in Addis Ababa's historic district on May 23.
24 May, 2010
ADDIS ABABA (AFP) – Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi's party leads the vote count across the country following weekend elections, officials said Monday, but claims mounted that the ballot had been fixed.
The day after largely peaceful legislative polls, the electoral commission announced that partial results showed Zenawi's EPRDF party ahead in all areas, including the capital, where the opposition came out on top in 2005.
"In all the regional states, EPRDF is leading," said national election commission head Merga Bekana. "EPRDF is so far winning in the house of people representatives."
Final results are not expected to be published until June 21, but Meles appeared set to extend his 19 years in power.
According to the partial results, the ruling party had 3.9 million votes compared to only 117,790 for main opposition coalition Medrek in the Oromo region, also previously won by the opposition.
In the capital Addis Ababa, the ruling party held a sizeable lead of 403,621 to 264,607 for the opposition, the partial results showed.
The election board had earlier said that turnout was huge, with 90 percent of the Horn of Africa country's 32 million registered voters casting ballots.
Bekana said the partial results were based on about three-quarters of polling stations counted.
The European Union's observation mission chief Thijs Berman on Sunday praised the vote as "peaceful and calm" and the election commission said it had no evidence of fraud.
A coalition of Ethiopian civil society groups also called the elections "free, fair and democratic," but opposition leaders cried foul and international organisation Human Rights Watch harshly criticised the vote.
Opposition leaders in several parts of the country complained that voters were intimidated and their observers barred from many polling stations, leaving room for ballot box-stuffing.
Human Rights Watch, which had already pilloried the regime for stifling the opposition during the campaign, gave an assessment of Sunday's vote that was in stark contrast with the EU observers' initial comments.
"Behind an orderly facade, the government pressured, intimidated and threatened Ethiopian voters," said Rona Peligal, the New York-based watchdog's acting Africa director.
"Whatever the results, the most salient feature of this election was the months of repression preceding it."
Fearing a low turnout, ruling coalition officials and militia "went house to house telling citizens to register to vote and to vote for the ruling party or face reprisals," Human Rights Watch said.
Government spokesman Shimeles Kemal refuted the claims.
"No systematic intimidation has taken place," he told AFP. "The ruling party has taught its supporters and members that they should strictly abide by the rules of engagement" which are against intimidation.
Shimeles accused HRW of waging a "smear campaign" against the government.
The last polls in 2005 saw the opposition record its best ever showing but led to violence that left 200 dead and triggered a government crackdown that left its main challengers jailed, exiled or greatly weakened.
The opposition's most charismatic figure, Birtukan Mideksa, who has sometimes been dubbed "the Ethiopian Aung San Suu Kyi" in reference to Myanmar's iconic detained democracy activist, was jailed in 2008.
While opposition candidates vented their anger, their supporters seemed unprepared to take protests to the streets in a repeat of the 2005 events.
"I don't think there ever will be any incident on the scale of 2005. People get tired of bickering. I think everyone wants to enjoy living peacefully now, no matter what they think of the government," said a voter in the southern opposition stronghold of Oromiya.
Despite his poor rights record, Meles is steering ambitious development programmes and rapid economic growth that earn him solid support at home and abroad.
Foreign criticism of the government has been muted as Meles -- whose country borders Eritrea and Somalia -- remains a key US and Western ally in the fight against Islamic extremism.
