ELECTORAL BOARD FURTHER RESTRICTING ETHIOPIAN

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 ADDIS ABABA 000102 SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 01/22/2020 TAGS: PGOV PHUM KDEM ET SUBJECT: ELECTORAL BOARD FURTHER RESTRICTING ETHIOPIAN POLITICAL SPACE REF: A. O9 ADDIS 2903 ¶B. 09 ADDIS 3010 Classified By: Classified by CDA John Yates for Reasons 1.4 (B) and (D) ¶1. (C) Summary: National Electoral Board of Ethiopia (NEBE) Chairman Merga told the Ethiopian Partners Group (EPG) the NEBE itself will conduct all voter education for the 2010 elections, leaving no role for civil society organizations in that process although they may be allowed to formally observe the elections. Merga expects 30 million Ethiopians to register to vote. He said dispersement of federal funds to political parties for the campaign will begin soon with most money going to the ruling party in proportion to its parliamentary majority. Merga said election-related complaints will be handled at the grassroots level by the new Joint Council of Political Parties created by the electoral Code of Conduct or by the branch offices of the NEBE at the regional levels. End Summary. ¶2. (U) On January 21 the Ethiopian Partners Group - Committee 1 on Democracy and Governance (EPG 1),chaired by the Charge d'Affairs of Germany, Michael Biontino, met with the National Electoral Board of Ethiopia (NEBE) Chairman Merga Bekana and Deputy Chairman Addisu Gebreigzabhier. Approximately 15 Ambassadors or their representatives, including newly arrived United States Embassy Charge d' Affaires John Yates, attended the meeting. Ambassadors raised a series of questions to which Chairman Merga responded in the course of the fifty minute meeting. VOTER EDUCATION -------------- ¶3. (SBU) Chairman Merga surprised the group by announcing at the outset that all voter education for the 2010 election cycle would be conducted by the NEBE due to what he called "serious concerns" about irregularities that arose in the 2005 elections because there was no uniformity in voter education between the regions in the conduct of such education. According to Merga, the Board has made the decision that there will be no civil society organization participation in voter education in this election. (Comment: Voter education groups have been severely impacted by the prohibition against foreign funding contained in Ethiopia,s 2009 civil society law by. This NEBE decision to monopolize voter education has the advantage, from the GOE perspective, of mooting out applications from some of those groups for 
waivers from the foreign-funding restriction. End Comment.) Merga added that the NEBE is publishing a voter education manual and has trained 220,000 electoral officers who will begin to organize public outreach. When queried about the neutrality of the electoral officers, Merga offered assurances that the NEBE will hold them accountable. VOTER REGISTRATION -------------- ¶4. (C) Voter registration is going smoothly and according to the established electoral calendar, Merga said, and has been extended ten days. British Ambassador Norman Ling questioned whether Ethiopia might experience under-registration due to a lack of advertisement of the voter registration process. Merga responded that experience suggested that people tend to register at the end of the registration period. He said 25.5 million citizens registered in 2005 and the NEBE expects 30 million this year although only 7 million have registered so far and the registration deadline is February 17. He said that the registration date "could" be extended further if necessary, but definitely not the date of the election. In response to a question from the Spanish Ambassador, Merga clarified that Ethiopia does not use a voter registration list from the previous election, but starts from scratch with a "fresh list" for each election. FUNDING FOR POLITICAL PARTIES -------------- ¶5. (SBU) Merga said there were 79 registered political parties and, although the NEBE had not yet determined exactly which were contending in the election, more than 20 had registered candidates. He said the breakout of funding would ADDIS ABAB 00000102 002 OF 002 begin very soon with ten percent of available federal funds being divided equally among all contending parties. The remaining 90 percent of the electoral budget would be apportioned according to a party,s number of seats in parliament and number of female candidates. He estimated the process would begin in the next few days. (Note: EPRDF has 367 of 547 seats in parliament and 25-30 percent of its candidates will likely be female, assuring that the ruling party will receive an overwhelming share of federal campaign funds. End Note.) ELECTORAL OBSERVATION -------------- ¶6. (SBU) When asked about civil society organizations (CSOs) that have applied to participate in domestic observation, Merga responded that the Board has received numerous applications and is considering them, and "may choose to accept them all." The country is large and there are many polling stations, so there is no reason why we couldn't use many CSOs to do the observation, he added. Merga also explained there will be five &public observers8 per polling station. He added that international observers, such as those from the European Union, are the mandate of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. COMPLAINTS MECHANISM -------------- ¶7. (U) Merga said that the electoral Code of Conduct (Ref B) which was signed into law in December created a Joint Council of Political Parties to which individuals or parties could bring complaints at the grassroots level. He did not offer a specific answer to a question as to how this mechanism was functioning. He affirmed that the NEBE had branch offices at the regional levels and had trained the officers at those levels on how to handle complaints. ¶8. (C) Comment: The meeting between the EPG-1 and the NEBE was a long awaited and sought-after. The tone of the meeting was cordial. The Ambassadors engaged in a polite dialogue and requested follow-up meetings with Merga and Addisu on a regular basis in the months leading up to the election. They appeared amenable to this suggestion. Collegiality aside, however, the NEBE,s decision to remove from the campaign any prospect of non-NEBE voter education effort represents a probable blow to prospects for a free and fair election in Ethiopia. End comment. YATES