WASHINGTON, May 12, 2012 (AFP)
WASHINGTON, May 12, 2012 (AFP)
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton hailed Algeria’s elections Saturday, welcoming the large number of women elected and calling the vote a “welcome step” toward democratic reform.
Official results for Thursday’s legislative election yielded a higher than expected turnout of 42 percent, with the party that has ruled the country since independence 50 years ago winning comfortably and Islamists losing ground.
But Algeria’s main Islamist group in the polls — the Green Algeria alliance — charged the polls to elect a new national assembly were fraudulent.
Clinton nonetheless said “these elections — and the high number of women elected — are a welcome step in Algeria’s progress toward democratic reform,” in a statement issued by her spokeswoman Victoria Nuland.
“The United States looks forward to working together with the newly elected National Popular Assembly and to continuing to strengthen our ties with the government and the people of Algeria,” she added.
President Abdelaziz Bouteflika’s National Liberation Front, which has been in power since independence from France in 1962, garnered 220 of the 462 seats up for grabs.
After a campaign marked by deep voter disaffection, many Algerians however argue that the interior ministry’s results were manipulated and far removed from reality after a campaign marked by deep voter disaffection.
One opposition party said its own observations suggested turnout was less than half the 42 percent announced by the interior ministry.
The head of the European Union observation team, Jose Ignacio Salafranca, listed a number of shortcomings in the electoral process, but stopped short of challenging its overall credibility.
