Niger Holds Parliamentary Elections Tomorrow

Will tomorrow’s parliamentary elections allow Niger’s President Mamadou Tandja to further consolidate his power?

After months of political turmoil, on August 4th Tandja held and won a referendum to extend his term in office. Since then, conflict between the incumbent and the opposition has continued through protests, arrests, and a general climate of tension punctuated by opposition calls for outside intervention.

Niamey, Niger

That intervention began this weekend at a meeting of the Economic Community of West African States in Abuja. ECOWAS “called…for elections planned for next week in Niger to be called off and imposed limited sanctions on Niamey,” and “barred Niamey from putting up candidates for posts in international organisations or hosting ECOWAS meetings.”

Regional outcry and domestic protest has not dissuaded Tandja from pursuing the elections as planned. With an opposition boycott in effect, the president’s allies appear poised to win a massive number of seats.

Six million people are eligible to vote to elect the new 113-member parliament, but the campaign has been marked by indifference among residents, who only have the right to hold small local gatherings.

Although there are a handful of independent candidates, some 20 political parties participating in the poll are close to the regime.

Members of security agencies will start voting today.

As of this writing, the National Assembly’s website lists four major groups in the parliament: CDS (22 seats), MNSD/PSDN (Tandja’s party, 48 seats), PNDS (25 seats), and a group of smaller parties (18 seats). We’ll see how the composition changes after the vote; from the look of things now it could be quite different by later this week.