(Xinhua) — {The 45-member African Union (AU) election observer mission to Namibia on Sunday said the political environment leading to Namibia’s elections on Friday was “generally peaceful and calm.”}
The AU observers encouraged Namibia to continue “in the same manner,” post-elections after all the collated election results are released on Sunday.
“Political parties freely campaigned and reached out to voters, ” the AU observer mission headed by Ambassador Fatuma Ndangiza, the Chairperson of the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM) Panel of Eminent Persons, said on Sunday.
The AU observers noted the fact the Electoral Act provides for mandatory disclosure of party expenditure but that the same Act “does not place a ceiling on party candidate campaign expenditure, neither does it regulate funding sources of party finances.”
It expressed concern over the effect “unregulated flow of money during elections could disadvantage small political parties with limited access to particular sources of funding as well as the possible subversion of the will of voters.”
The AU observer mission’s statement was a veiled reference to the fact business people accused of trying to curry favor in terms of lucrative tenders have in weeks leading to Friday’s elections donated buses and huge amount of money to Swapo but they did not do the same with the smaller parties not in power.
On the fact the Electoral Act of Namibia places a blanket ban on people with mental or intellectual disability from participating in the elections, AU observers drew to the attention of the Namibian Government to its obligations under Article 12 of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disability “to ensure that legal capacity is the only basis for political participation. ”
The AU mission that observed the elections on Friday whose final results are due later on Sunday comprised of observers drawn of African ambassadors to the AU, Pan African Parliament (PAP), Election Management Bodies, and Civil Society Organizations from; Botswana, Burundi, Ethiopia, Gambia, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mauritania, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, South Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda and Zimbabwe.
The AU mission was guided by the Constitutive Act of AU adopted in July 2000, the OAU/AU Declaration of the Principles Governing Democratic Elections in Africa as adopted by the Assembly of the African Heads of State and Government of the African Union and the African Guidelines for Election Observation and Monitoring Missions, both adopted in July 2002 and also by the African Charter on Democracy, Elections and Governance which entered into force in 2012.
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