C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 NOUAKCHOTT 000578

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/14/2016
TAGS: PREL PGOV PHUM PINR EAID KPAO MR
SUBJECT: MORE VOTERS TO BE ABLE TO REGISTER BEFORE
PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS IN MARCH 2007

REF: NOUAKCHOTT 409

Classified By: Amb. Joseph LeBaron, Reasons 1.4 (b),(d)

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(C) Key Points
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-- Voters who failed to register during the recent
registration campaign will have another opportunity to
register in January 2007, in time for the March 2007
presidential election, according to Mauritania's Independent
Electoral Commission.

-- So far, nearly one million Mauritanians have registered to
vote. The government asserts that this represents 96% of all
eligible voters, with fewer than 40,000 left to register.

-- However, a closer look at their figures suggests the
number left to register might be closer to 150,000. And that
higher number does not include the unknown number of
Mauritanians who don't have National ID cards.

-- An Electoral Commission member acknowledged that problems
remain in applying for National ID cards required for voter
registration (reftel).

-- All that said, the national voter list, even if incomplete
at this stage, appears to be virtually fraud-free. Those
names on the list are the true names of legitimate voters; a
significant achievement, given Mauritania's electoral
history.

-- The UN System Coordinator said that a team of UN auditors
would arrive in June to assess the census process.
She has told Ambassador that she expects the auditors to find
that the census process meets international standards.

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(C) Comments
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-- It would have been even better if Mauritanian voters who
missed -- or were denied -- the opportunity to register could
register before the Parliamentary elections this Fall.
Embassy will keep up the pressure on the government to
re-open lists prior to the November municipal and
Parliamentary elections.

-- Remarkably, there is no evidence that ineligible voters

have been placed on the voter lists, a problem that
repeatedly plagued past elections.

-- The transition to democracy underway in Mauritania is far
from perfect, but the problems of which we are aware (reftel)
do not suggest to us that the international community should
withdraw its support for the process.

End Key Points and Comments.


1. (C) Representatives from the Ministry of Interior,
National Office of Statistics, National Independent Electoral
Commission, UN Electoral Assistance team, NDI, and various
international partners met May 5 to discuss the census and
voter registration drive which ended April 30 after two and a
half months.

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Registration Figures
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2. (C) The Director General of the National Office of
Statistics and National Coordinator for the Census and Voter
Registration Baba Ould Boumein reported that 1,013,427
Mauritanians had been registered out of an estimated
1,053,424 eligible voters, declaring that the list was
therefore 96 pct complete. He then said that 18,477 of those
registered were found to be duplicate registrations, so the
final figure would in fact be 994,950 total registered
voters.


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3. (C) The estimate of 1,053,424 total eligible Mauritanian
voters is derived from the 1,313,424 National ID cards that
have been issued since 2000 (when Mauritania began issuing
their current ID cards). The National Office of Statistics
then subtracted 35,000 to account for deaths (based on
mortality rates rather than civil documents), 135,000 to
account for those Mauritanians who have left Mauritania (no
methodology for this number was offered), and 90,000 to
account for those that for various reasons do not currently
have their ID cards (such as people whose cards were lost or
destroyed).


4. (C) Meeting participants questioned the elimination of
these 90,000 eligible voters and called for the figure to be
added back into the total number of eligible voters. If
these 90,000 are included, then according to Ministry of
Interior figures, the census and registration drive has
registered 87 pct of all eligible voters (rather than the 96
percent that Boumein had originally presented) as there are
a total of 150,000 still to be registered.

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Assessment of the census process
--------------


5. (C) Secretary General of the National Independent
Electoral Commission Ahmed Ould Lefghih praised the
government's registration efforts, adding that "these efforts
should be continued to allow other registrants to be added to
the voter lists in January."


6. (C) However, Electoral Commission board member Ely Ould
Allaf said the Ministry of Interior's figures were
problematic in that they only counted those Mauritanians with
ID cards, and "excluded those that had requested cards but
not received them." While praising government efforts so
far, he criticized the slowness of the authorities to
adjudicate claims for ID cards, and the lack of
responsiveness to requests for ID card application data. He
hoped that the Electoral Commission would be able to report
soon on the numbers of pending cases, but noted that
approximately 20 percent of citizens in the eastern Tagant
region did not have the required cards. He encouraged the
government to continue issuing cards so more people could
register in January.


7. (C) Ministry of Interior official Sidi Yeslem Ould Amar
Chein said "the government has taken every effort to ensure a
transparent process," adding that "what problems we have seen
have come from the existing government structure and not the
Census and voter registration process." He pointed out that
many Mauritanians, especially those who live in rural
villages, have never needed ID cards, which are normally
needed for salaried employment, schooling or travel.


8. (C) In a session among partners immediately following the
meeting, all recommended to keep pressure on the government
to re-open lists prior to the November municipal and
legislative elections. UN Principal Technical Advisor
Mathieu Bile Bouah believed that if the government re-opened
census offices for just two weeks, it would allow enough time
for the rest of the eligible voters who obtain ID cards in
the coming months to register.


9. (C) Bouah said the UN was still waiting for the government
to provide a public financing scheme for political parties,
the determination of a voting method (proportional
representation v. winner-take-all), and the system for
ensuring 20 percent female participation in the coming
parliament. Lefghih joined Bouah in stressing the need for
the government to begin its education outreach to voters for
the November Constitutional Referendum.
LeBaron