The CENI is deploying over the whole territory without established goals

The electoral commission remains anyway one more HAT propaganda tooll, Andry Rajoelina’s way to organize alleged democratic, free and transparent elections. The commission is however finding it hard, either to deny its basic mission of providing legitimacy to the incoming republic in an unilateral way, or to complete its job with such a label on the back . Legislative elections were wanted by Andry Rajoelina to be taking place on March 2010 as the CENI was not yet born. August 12th, 2010’s referendum was supposed to be the electoral commission’s first achievement, but the vote has been postponed once again, as the HAT still has to strain to patch a political consensus up.  

For the time being, the CENI is still justifying its statute. President Hery Rakotomanana emphatically repeated that this commission is in no way byous for being made of law experts stemming from the civil society, the HAT interior ministry and various political groups. « The CENI is striving to respect and complete its duty described by the electoral code « , added the lawyers’ order’s spokesman. According to Hery Rakotomanana, the electoral law is expecting the CENI’s mission to prepare and supervise the voting process as well as to publish temporary results.  

Due to a lack of elections, the CENI is now restricting its action into deploying countrywide. « We are straining to spread our capacity throughout provinces in order to keep in control of the process everywhere », explained Hery Rakotomanana. Prior to this deployment, the electoral commission is going to  meet with 119 district chiefs in Antananarivo. In the run of the CENI deployment project, nine electoral agents are expected to act in every district. They will be supported by ten regional agents and 7 members per commune. Three electoral observers are going to supervise each of the 17 500 polling stations. According to the law, these civil society agents will have to produce an oath about their independence from whatever political party.  

Will the CENI be fulfilling its mission with some 60,000 agents? It has actually very little to rely on as a legacy from the late national Electoral Commission ( local CNE) and from the interior ministry discharged from any action.  The first 100 millions of ariary from an estimated 1 billion of ariary granted by finance law, happen to be far from enough. The HAT is intending to provide the commission with a 3,750 billions of ariary capacity.  

Even though the deployment is still underway, the CENI’s president said that the commission is already bound to organize a transparent election. « We are inviting the officials in charge of the constitution project to complete their duty in due time », declared Hery Rakotomanana. THe stand is more that curious since the CENI  and no one else would benefit from the referendum’s postponement.