Benin: a day of voting suspended on questions of participation and the pandemic

Text by: RFI Follow

Benin voted this Sunday May 17 to elect the municipal councils of the country's 77 communes. All offices have closed and completed the count. Apart from the political issue of sponsorship of mayors for the 2021 presidential election, there was a health issue due to the Covid-19 epidemic. Finally, there is the issue of the participation rate. Several major opposition parties were absent from this Sunday's vote.

Publicity

With our correspondent in Cotonou, Jean-Luc Aplogan

The voters who went to the polls each had a motivation. "  I came to vote, we choose those who will direct us at the base," explains a voter. I think it's useful. Local elections don't touch us anymore  . ”

The record abstention from the legislative elections and the absence of USL and the resistance forces from the race, put the stake in the participation rate back in good stead. "  There is no crowds, found a voter Sunday morning in her polling station. My vote took me barely ten minutes. Maybe in the evening, there will be more people  ”.

Civil society made the same observation in the morning. This trend of voters arriving drop by drop would have improved outside of Cotonou, we whisper on the power side. The electoral commission has not published figures on the mobilization or not of voters, civil society organizations either, who say they continue to collect information

Several voters voted with their faces covered with masks, unfortunately these anti-Covid-19 measures were not respected everywhere. "  Where I returned, many did not wash their hands, inside, the distance of 1 meter was not kept,  " regrets a voter.

The Céna will now start to compile the figures and publish the results no later than May 24. Civil society organizations ask him to ensure the integrity of the counting reports.

On the platform we feared and we continue to fear that there is a peak of people infected with the virus as a result of this election which promotes the mixing of the world, with a population that we had not finished raising awareness. ..

Fatoumata Batoko Zossou

Florence Morice

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