Democratic Republic of the Congo general election, 2017

Democratic Republic of the Congo
This article is part of a series on the
politics and government of
the Democratic Republic of the Congo
Foreign relations
United Nations Mission

General elections were scheduled to be held in the Democratic Republic of the Congo on 27 November 2016 to determine a successor to incumbent President Joseph Kabila, but have been delayed with a commitment to hold them by the end of 2017.[1] According to the Constitution of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the second and final term of President Kabila expired on 20 December 2016.[2]

It is not yet known who will run in the presidential elections, although Kabila is constitutionally unable to participate.

Background

On 29 September 2016, the Independent National Electoral Commission (CENI) announced that the elections would not be held until early 2018. According to CENI's vice president, the commission "hasn’t called elections in 2016 because the number of voters isn’t known."[3] The announcement came ten days after deadly protests in Kinshasa against Kabila, saw 17 people killed. The opposition alleged that Kabila had intentionally delayed the elections to remain in power.[2]

An agreement reached with the opposition in December 2016 allowed Kabila to stay in office with a requirement to hold elections by the end of 2017. However, on 7 July 2017, CENI President Corneille Nangaa said it would not be possible to organize presidential elections by the end of the year.[4] Opposition leader Felix Tshisekedi condemned the announcement on Twitter, saying Nangaa had "declared war on the Congolese people."[5]

Electoral system

The President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo is elected by plurality vote in one round.[6]

The 500 members of the National Assembly are elected by two methods; 60 are elected from single-member constituencies using first-past-the-post voting, and 440 are elected from 109 multi-member constituencies by open list proportional representation, with seats allocated using the largest remainder method.[7]

References

  1. ↑ Global electoral calendar NDI
  2. 1 2 "DR Congo election: 17 dead in anti-Kabila protests". BBC News. BBC. 19 September 2016. Retrieved 29 September 2016.
  3. ↑ Wilson, Thomas; Mbatha, Amogelgang (29 September 2016). "Congo Election Body Proposes Two-Year Wait for Presidential Vote". Bloomberg BusinessWeek. Retrieved 29 September 2016.
  4. ↑ Congo Election Commission: Vote Can't Be Held by End of Year The New York Times, 8 July 2017
  5. ↑ Felix A. Tshisekedi Twitter
  6. ↑ Democratic Republic of the Congo IFES
  7. ↑ Electoral system IPU
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.