We are for democratic empowerment — UN

 By The guardian reporter

The Zanzibar Electoral Commission (ZEC) chairman, Jecha Salim Jecha

 The United Nations has said it is working closely with the government of Tanzania in many areas including the implementation of the Democratic Empowerment Project, which seeks to enable the country to conduct credible elections.

Reacting to yesterday’s lead story in this paper that the body was leading talks on the stand-off on Zanzibar’s presidential election, UN Resident Coordinator, Alvaro Rodriguez said yesterday that they were not “leading” the efforts but “liaising with national authorities and the international community to promote a peaceful, inclusive and credible elections process”.

“Under the overall coordination of UNDP, and working closely with UN Women and UNESCO, the UN is implementing the Democratic Empowerment Project (DEP) which has four main components namely  First, supporting legal and institutional reform for credible elections; Second, support improvement of elections management bodies capacity; Third, promote inclusive participation in political and electoral processes, and Fourth, support national peace infrastructure to mitigate and resolve election-related conflicts,” he said.

 

He added that as part of such efforts, “the UN Secretary General has discussed issues of common interest for the UN and Tanzania on the current political situation in Zanzibar.”

 

On Sunday, Zanzibar Presidential candidate on the Civic United Front (CUF) ticket, Seif Shariff Hamad told reporters in the island that the UN was one of the many stakeholders who were participating in the ongoing negotiations between his party and the government to rescue the Isles from caving in into political anarchy.

 

Hamad, who is also the CUF secretary general said that the talks which were also attended by representatives from international observers who sent their teams to Zanzibar, were proceeding well, calling the people of Zanzibar to stay calm. 

 

“We are now hopeful and have faith that solution on the matter will be found as soon as possible,” Hamad told newsmen on Sunday, asking Zanzibaris to be ready to get their democratic right they have been waiting for a long time.

 

The politician who is also the isles outgoing First Vice President urged Zanzibaris to ensure that peace and harmony were maintained, when leaders of the two sides were holding talks to resolve the political impasse.

 

The statement came as signal to calm down anxious wananchi after his earlier threat to leave the fragile matter to voters themselves to seek justice. 

 

On Friday, Hamad issued a three-day ultimatum to the Zanzibar government to proceed with the release of the election results or let Zanzibaris decide their own fate. The ultimatum ended on Sunday.

 

Hamad’s ultimatum followed the decision reached last week by the Zanzibar Electoral Commission (ZEC) chairman, Jecha Salim Jecha, to nullify the General Election.

 

The ZEC chairman claimed that the election wasn’t transparent and had a number of shortfalls.

 

Speaking to ‘The Guardian’ yesterday CUF director for communications Ismail Jussa said that the talks were actually taking place and UN representatives were there.

 

 He said the efforts were initiated by friendly countries who wished Tanzania well under their collective umbrella ‘Friends of Tanzania’.