2023-08-10 19:03:42
On the evening of Wednesday, August 9, the president of the transition issued a decree to change the method of appointing the presidents of neighborhood and district councils. Colonel Mamadi Doum-bouillant now grants regional governors the power to appoint neighborhood leaders, to the great displeasure of political actors and civil society.
The CNRD continues to spread its wings. While special delegations have almost finished replacing elected municipal executives, the junta is unraveling decentralization a little more, by now focusing on district and neighborhood councils. Until yesterday, heads of neighborhoods and districts were elected. According to the revised Electoral Code of 2017, in its article 99 “the designation of the members of the District or Neighborhood Council is made in proportion to the results obtained in the districts and neighborhoods by the lists of candidates for the municipal election. The President of the Neighborhood or District Council is appointed by the political entity whose list came first, in the communal ballot, in the said district or neighborhood”. This arrangement is just a memory. A decree of Doum-boiling read on the antennas of the national TV candy abolishes it purely and simply. The head of the junta gives all the latitude to the regional governors, by administrative decision, to make these appointments. According to the decree, it is sufficient that the persons concerned are of Guinean nationality, that they are at least 21 years old, and have a main residence in the neighborhood or district. They must also be able to read and write in French; have resided in the neighborhood or district for at least ten years, have the physical and mental capacities; good communication and listening skills; be available and have control of the territorial limits of the neighborhood or district; not to have been stripped of his civic rights by a court decision.
A snub to democracy?
The provision that neighborhood and district councils are appointed in proportion to the results obtained in the communal elections was not unanimously accepted. Many political parties contested this way of doing things and accused the UFDG and the RPG of pushing aside, through this “scheme”, the small political parties. The RPG, beaten by the opposition in several electoral constituencies in 2018, notably in Conakry, had categorically refused the provision. But the political actors surely did not find anything better, they were taken by surprise. Instead of the elected Heads of Districts, and under the responsibility of the communal executives, they will now have District Heads appointed by Governors who are totally won over to the mystery of the Sidewalk Administration and Decentralization. A MATD which caresses itself the dream of organizing the elections from now on. Something is brewing.
Yacine Diallo
#District #Chiefs #longer #elected