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More than half of the seats are decided before the day. Gambians began voting on April 4th in local elections in which more than half of the ruling party's seats went unchallenged due to an opposition boycott. Voters queued up in long lines in the capital Banjul to cast their ballot by dropping a glass marble into a coloured drum representing their candidate, a system chosen because of the west African country's high illiteracy rate. Each marble strikes a bell that sounds loudly, to prevent multiple voting. The polls were scrapped in 68 of the 114 electoral wards held by the ruling Alliance for Patriotic Reorientation and Construction (APRC) after opposition parties pulled out, claiming that the vote would be rigged. Ahead of the election, the chairman of the country's Independent Electoral Commission, Muspaha Carayol , urged all Gambians to “denounce any action that is opposed to the progress of this nation and to resist any attempt by any person to lure us into tribal, religious or ethnic considerations” during the vote. Observers from several diplomatic missions in Banjul, including the British and US embassies, were seen at various polling stations. While six opposition parties boycotted the elections, one opposition leader, Hamat Bah , rejected the boycott call, saying his party did not believe in it. Gambia, one of Africa's smallest and poorest countries with a population of about 1.7m, has been ruled with an iron fist by President Yahya Jammeh since he came to power in a bloodless coup in July 1994. Jammeh, who claims he can cure AIDS, is often pilloried for rights abuses and the muzzling of journalists. Despite the criticism, he enjoys strong support for overseeing strong economic growth and building roads, schools and hospitals. In a country where half the population is illiterate and 67% of people live on less than $1.25 a day, Jammeh has also won votes in the past by threatening to isolate regions that do not support him. (© AFP 4/4 2013)
Africa Research Bulletin: Political, Social and Cultural Series – Wiley
Published: May 1, 2013
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