Ivory Coast votes on new constitution

Ivory Coast's military junta leader General Robert Guei casts his vote in a referendum on the in Abidjan on Sunday

July 23, 2000
Web posted at: 11:10 p.m. EDT (0310 GMT)

ABIDJAN (Reuters) -- Ivory Coast's army rulers, keen to win maximum support for a constitution that will underpin their civilian rule transition, gave people extra time to vote on it and declared Monday a public holiday to allow this.

The extension of Sunday's referendum followed organizational delays and confusion at polling stations in the main city Abidjan and further afield that frayed tempers and brought accusations of sabotage.

But with the head of the National Public Salvation Committee (CNSP) junta, General Robert Guei, and the main political parties calling for a Yes vote, attention focused as much on the turnout as on likely opposition to the draft.

"We in the CNSP decided to satisfy the wishes of Ivorians who wanted, through their massive vote, to enable Ivory Coast to enter the new millennium with a democratic constitution," Communication Minister Henri Cesar Sama told state television.

Sama, government spokesman and a member of the junta, said that the problems experienced in Sunday's polling were lessons for future elections in the transition.

Voters in the Ivory Coast wait in line at a polling station in Abidjan

"Tonight, we will do our utmost to put right what needs putting right and correct as needed," he said, adding that the aim was to ensure that everyone who wanted to vote could do so.

Guei was among those who blamed the logistical glitches on sabotage, but on the whole the poll passed off peacefully with no reports of major incident from around the country.

Guei signed a decree allowing polling stations, where necessary, to remain open until noon (1200 GMT) on Monday.

Officials in Abidjan and upcountry said that counting took place after the original 6 p.m. closing time in polling stations where the vote passed off smoothly. State television said that it would not broadcast first results until 10 a.m. on Monday.

A total of more than 4.8 million people were eligible to vote in the referendum, the first poll of a promised transition following the West African country's first coup in December.

Guei, installed as head of state by soldiers who toppled President Henri Konan Bedie after a dispute over allowances and a festering political crisis, has called a presidential election for September 17.

Many suspect that he plans to run for president.

Under the draft constitution, a new civilian president and parliament would take office no later that six months after the promulgation of the approved text.

Voters that arrived early wait for polls to open inside the grounds of a primary school converted into a polling station

Voters had to accept or reject the draft in its entirety, along with a draft electoral code.

Debate centered on who was eligible to run for president, the subject of a bitter nationality debate that has split the world's top cocoa producer along ethnic lines.

The draft also proposes other changes -- from lowering the voting age to 18 from 21 to abolishing the death penalty.

Former Prime Minister Alassane Ouattara, the man at the center of the nationality debate, voted on Sunday and looked forward to being able to run in September

Ouattara, whose power base is the Moslem north, has called for a Yes vote. He says that he is Ivorian and is confident of fulfilling the conditions required of a presidential candidate.

"I hope that... the elections, particularly the presidential elections, will take place peacefully and that all of us will be able to compete," he told Reuters Television.

His opponents say he is a national of northern neighbor, Burkina Faso.

Copyright 2000 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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