“The preference of the 2023 local elections over electoral reform”

Tammuz Organization for Social Development, in collaboration with the Iraqi Network for Monitoring and in partnership with the Friedrich Ebert Foundation, held a conference titled “The Preference of the 2023 Local Elections over Electoral Reform” on Saturday, March 2, 2024, in Baghdad.

The conference was attended by more than 50 individuals, including representatives of the Independent High Electoral Commission, civil society organizations, candidates, academics, and stakeholders in the electoral process. The conference was divided into two sessions. The first session, moderated by activist colleague Hanan Hamoud, featured a presentation of the monitoring report by Tammuz Organization’s monitoring network, presented by colleague Vian Al-Sheikh Ali. The report included several key topics related to the electoral process, such as the advantages of the current biometric card and its importance in reducing fraud. The report also addressed the main objectives of biometric registration, highlighted the accompanying shortcomings, and documented the adoption of 134 electoral lists, including 39 alliances, 29 parties, and 66 individual candidates, with a total of 5,904 candidates, including 4,242 males and 1,662 females.

Candidates are required to have a clean legal record, subjecting them to security and judicial scrutiny, as well as accountability and justice procedures. However, these processes, particularly those related to accountability and justice, often experience delays, leading to delays in candidate approval and announcement, or inconsistencies resulting in a candidate being initially approved and later disqualified, or vice versa, causing instability in candidates’ legal status.

The organization noted several observations regarding election campaigns, including early commencement of campaigns before the official deadline, lack of clear electoral programs, and campaign propaganda focusing solely on generalities and unrealistic promises. Regarding violations during the electoral silence hours, the organization called for the punishment of violators to respect the law and apply international standards ensuring the integrity of elections.

The Electoral Commission opened 600 polling centers and 2,487 special voting stations, prepared to accommodate 1,050,653 eligible voters for special voting. The organization identified 20 critical observations on the process, including recurring technical faults in counting and reporting results from special voting stations, which affected trust in the process and contributed to a decrease in voter turnout in the general elections.

The second session of the conference, moderated by Dr. Ivan Kareem, focused on two main topics. The first was a critical study titled “Evaluation of the Legal System for Electoral Reform,” presented by Dr. Wael Mondher, a constitutional law professor. The study examined the legal provisions regulating elections, from the constitution to the effective electoral law, highlighting their flaws and features through detailed analysis of their provisions regarding candidacy rights, voting rights, electoral systems, election campaigns, electoral appeals, voter turnout calculation, seat allocation, and quotas for women and minorities. The study also proposed substantive reforms to the electoral legal framework.

“The Role of Civil Society and Monitoring Networks in Elections” is the title of the second axis of the second session, addressed by Mr. Hawker Jetu, the head of Shams Network. He emphasized the importance of electoral stakeholders trusting the integrity of the process, the necessity of the Independent High Electoral Commission’s independence, and the impact of the political and social climate on elections. He highlighted the active role of civil society in monitoring provincial council elections, the influence of political patronage on elections, and the need for fostering a healthy political culture through civic education.

“At the end, a set of observations, recommendations, and proposals were concluded, the most important of which are:

Observations:

– The presence of government support and insistence on holding elections on time and providing support to the Election Commission to facilitate its work despite calls for postponement.

– The unification of efforts of the alliance of national monitoring networks helped achieve integration and expansion of local oversight despite voluntary efforts of all organizations and networks without any funding.

– Cooperation and collaboration by members of the Commission Council and the National Office of the Independent Higher Electoral Commission with monitoring networks compared to the 2021 elections.

– Weakness in the awareness campaign regarding the necessity of biometric registration and its impact on participation in elections, as it was used as an exclusive voting card according to the law, resulting in the disenfranchisement of about 40% of eligible voters.

– Weak performance of the Commission in awareness and media campaigns to encourage citizens to participate in elections, especially considering popular dissatisfaction with the role of provincial councils since the October 2019 uprising, with a political boycott of a political bloc with a large audience.

– Weak turnout and participation rates in elections necessitate plans to enhance citizens’ role in political life and increase their confidence in the electoral process.

– Lack of international interest in monitoring provincial councils, and we did not notice the presence of international observers at our centers.

– Lack of funding for organizations and monitoring networks affected the spread and performance of actual monitoring networks.

– The Commission did not open voter update centers abroad, so Iraqi expatriates bear the expenses of traveling to their original provinces for updating purposes and receiving the card, then returning on election day to vote, which prevents them from exercising their right to vote effectively.

– Proposing a law to raise the candidacy age from 28 to the age of 30 on election day, which represents a setback in supporting youth participation in political life, especially since they have the right to establish and lead a party or political organization at the age of 25.

Recommendations:

– Making possession of the biometric card a condition for exercising the right to vote directly, not a condition for the eligibility of the voter, to ensure that the right to vote is not restricted, in accordance with the legal texts in Iraq and the international standards set for elections, especially regarding calculating participation rates.

– Lowering the candidacy age and making it equal to the legal age for establishing political parties, which is 25 years, based on the year in which the elections are held, not based on the voting day, to enhance youth participation in the political decision-making process.

– Working to coordinate with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to update the records of expatriate voters to facilitate their obtaining of the biometric card through embassies and consulates abroad.

– Working on stabilizing the legal legislation, especially the electoral law and the adopted electoral system.

– Establishing stability rules for legal situations and preserving the votes of voters from loss, requiring that a change in the makeup of the Accountability and Justice Commission not be accepted after their names have been approved and announced to the public, and this is due to the expiry of the periods for objection, unless their decision was issued based on fraud or deception by the candidate; in this case, the decision can be reconsidered.

– Adding a provision requiring holders of senior administrative positions (such as general managers) to vacate their administrative position six months before the election date to ensure the neutrality of administration during elections and prevent the exploitation of administrative positions.

– Detailing provisions for the distribution of women’s quota seats in the law clearly and unambiguously, to avoid repeated challenges to the seat distribution system, and adding an explicit clause stating that the winning woman does not count her votes within the seats allocated to the quota in order to achieve the essence of the quota in increasing women’s participation in political life.

– Establishing a voter registry for minorities to ensure that candidates for these seats are not voted for by individuals who do not belong to these social components.

– Making electoral appeals judicially considered at two levels, by several electoral judicial bodies each consisting of three judges of the first class, with the possibility of appealing the decisions of these bodies to the Federal Court of Cassation or a specialized appellate judicial body consisting of judges of the Federal Court of Cassation.

– Enacting a law that includes comprehensive regulation of political life funding to ensure transparency, monitoring, and accountability for the funding and expenses of parties and political entities, and achieve fairness in competition during electoral campaigns.

– Activating the texts of the law on political parties that prohibit military and semi-military organizations from participating in political life or being associated with parties or political organizations, as this contradicts the idea of peaceful power rotation.

– Addressing cases of drafting flaws and repetition in some provisions of the amended Electoral Law No. 12 of 2018.

– Proposing to allocate quotas for youth and benefit from international experiences.

– Legislatively prohibiting nomination if the number of seats in the electoral district is doubled.

– Printing fixed data for the biometric card (voter’s name, voter’s number) visibly on the voter’s card and storing all variable voter data (province, registration center, polling center, station) on the SIM card of the card.

– Developing an effective strategic plan for voter registration and ensuring their obtaining of the biometric card.

– Mandatory activation of legal and procedural deterrents by the Commission to prevent the phenomenon of early advertising and violations that occur during the campaign and electoral silence periods, in compliance with regulations and laws.

– The necessity of including social media platforms as advertising campaign platforms and also monitoring spending on them.

– Strengthening partnerships between the Commission and civil society organizations actively at all stages of the electoral process.

– Building partnerships between the Commission and educational institutions to educate about elections and their importance, and also incorporating them into educational curricula.

– Considering people with disabilities in representation and in securing and preparing polling stations to suit their capabilities.

– Legislatively requiring fingerprint matching with a specified number, such as four, and reducing cases where voting is done by bypassing.

– Redistributing voters in polling stations based on biometric card data to ensure smoothness and correct voting.

– Regulating and organizing the process of registering observers for organizations in line with the organization’s expertise and experience and the number of observers matching the number of centers in the electoral district.

– Allowing media coverage for all polling stations, not limited to specific centers.

– Allowing observers to bring their phones to polling stations.

– Allowing observers to travel between provinces and monitor in provinces other than their own to enhance oversight work.

– The necessity of supporting monitoring networks to maintain their continuity and professionalism to enhance the integrity of elections.– Announcing the results of each station in each center generally on the Commission’s website to increase confidence in the elections and reduce appeals.”