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10.
Conclusions and
Recommendations
The general
elections of 2001 have been conducted in a democratic context fully in
accordance with international standards. There are, however, factors,
which have had limiting effects upon full electoral participation, and
during the electoral observation by the EU mission, some conclusions
were reached which lend themselves to suggestions as to how the
election system might be perfected. The democratic restoration that is
taking place in Peru would profit from being supplemented in at least
two major fields, namely a legal refinement of the electoral system
and a statute for political parties (ley
de partidos).
The
legal framework of the election administration
·
In order to overcome certain problems inherent in
the current “tricephalia”,
a renewed or amended constitutional framework should reconsider the
relationship between the three electoral organisms introduced in the
constitution of 1993. It seems advisable to re-institute JNE in the
position of pre-eminent autonomy it held before 1993.
·
The legal provision of the three electoral
agencies receiving part of their revenue by “recursos proprios” from electoral fines appears as questionable.
Arrangements should be made for the three entities to be fully part of
the national budget, and for revenue from electoral fines to be
assigned directly to the national treasury.
·
The existing stringent and limiting requirements
for the registration of party candidates for congress should be
re-considered, in the sense of opening the system to wider
participation. This ought to include a more extensive admission of
candidates’ presentations in native languages.
Election
procedures
·
The parliamentary vote procedure, with its system
of preferences, has proved to be overly complicated. It was
significant that in the congressional of poll there were 1,29 mio.
spoilt/void ballots, plus a high number of blank votes, while the
presidential poll produced only 396.000 such “lost votes”. The
return to a simpler balloting system would make it easier for large
segments of the population, especially in rural areas, to effectively
exercise their right to political participation.
·
In the absence of such major amendments, it
should at least be considered, for future elections, to abandon the
design of a unitary ballot sheet, in order to avoid the delays in the
counting process which have affected the pronouncement of official
results for the presidential vote. This would also re-open the
possibility of providing temporary/mobile polling stations (for “transeuntes”).
·
Legal provisions exist for temporary residents’
polling stations (mesas de
transeuntes), but these have not been set up for the general
elections in April and June 2001. This has had the effect of excluding
a considerable part of Peru’s significant number of migrants from
voting, or subjecting them to prohibitive expenditures or fines. It is
therefore strongly recommended to grant temporary residents their
voting rights and reduce the arbitrarily long time limit for
applications for the respective permits (currently 90 days prior to
the election date) to a time frame more in accordance with the
technical administrative conditions granted by computer-age
developments.
·
Current provisions limiting the capacity assigned
to each polling board (mesa)
of 200, max. 300 voters seems inadequate. More flexibility is
advisable, since polling boards in highly urbanised areas could easily
accommodate up to 700 voters each, while smaller-sized arrangements
could continue to be applicable to outlying regions. Under the present
set-up, the 92.000 mesas country-wide have required the recruitment of a mesa-staff
of roughly 550.000 persons, with the ensuing difficulties to find
enough people able and willing to take over these functions.
Two
complementary measures might alleviate the situation: A concentration
of urban area polling boards could reduce the number of qualified mesa-staff
required; and offering higher per diem allowances for polling board
staff, matched by reducing or relinquishing the fines in case of
default (currently ca. US-$ 35) might then provide incentives for
prospective mesa-staff
members to feel more deeply identified with the civic obligation of
serving on polling boards.
·
According to current regulations, at each polling
board ballot sheets are destroyed immediately after the tally. A
subsequent audit or re-examination, especially in cases of challenges
and litigation, is not possible under such conditions. Internationally
accepted practice is that such records are usually kept for a period
of 6 months or more. It is suggested that the Peruvian system provide
for the ballot packages to be stored for some time, so that a recount
can be made in cases of serious challenges.
Functions
and obligations of political parties and their representatives
·
A future statute for political parties ought to
include regulations covering the accounting for party finance and
campaign expenses, providing for the necessary sanctions in cases of
non-compliance.
·
A more comprehensive regulation is needed for
financing electoral propaganda expenses. Alternatives would be: An
extension of the “franja
electoral” subsidy system (at present covering only TV and radio
channels) to the printed press; or: Preference for a “deuda
electoral”-system of
credit payments to all parties, subject to review of their poll
results (similar to the Costa Rican model).
·
Equally open to more stringent regulation is the
field of indirect “vote buying” by party candidates –
particularly in the campaign for the congressional election –
canvassing for votes by distributing meal tickets or food supplies
etc. to entire village populations. Under present rules, only the use
of public funds for such
ventures is forbidden and sanctioned, while the use of private riches
for such purposes is considered permissible.
·
The function of party representatives (personeros)
during the electoral process will
have to be reviewed and re-defined, in order to preclude any undue
political influence. Their role ought to be defined as “party
observers” (instead of “fiscales”), so as to make it impossible for them to participate
directly in mesa activities
and be informally co-opted as staff members.
In Peru, during
the last weeks of the electoral campaign for the run-off poll, a
renewed debate on electoral and constitutional reform had begun in
political and academic circles. This is a matter that normally should
be considered as beyond the responsibility and calling of
international observers. However, since the discussion has been opened
on the issue of the traditional prohibition for active police and
armed forces personnel to participate in elections, the EU Core Team
feels called upon to make a final comment.
The role of the
Peruvian forces of public order and defence is obviously in a process
of becoming a more and more integral part of the democratic society.
As this transformation proceeds, normalisation in civic-military
relations could only positively be affected by a revision of the
entrenched principle of non-participation. An amendment in this sense
is therefore strongly commended.
The
EU mission team are confident that the international community, and
the European Union, will continue to show an active interest in this
encouraging development and will continue to provide their support.
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