July 15 (EUROPA PRESS) –
The spokesman for the United States Department of State, Matthew Miller, has expressed this Friday his concern about “the irregularities in the electoral results announced by the Electoral Commission of Sierra Leone (ECSL)” and has asked the Government for an “independent and external investigation of the electoral process”.
“The tabulations and analysis of parallel and independent votes carried out by accredited national and international observation missions raise questions about the integrity of the official results,” reads a statement published by the State Department.
Miller has also expressed concern about reports of intimidation — including death threats — against national and international observers, as well as against members of the ECSL and civil society organizations.
In this sense, the State spokesman has appealed “to all actors to exercise restraint and participate in a peaceful dialogue to resolve their disputes.”
At the same time, he has suggested that the recommendations of said observers be taken into account to “improve electoral modalities” in future elections.
“The resolve and determination of Sierra Leoneans who went to the polls on June 24 to make their voices heard were inspiring. (…) The Government and political parties must commit to strengthening democratic institutions to better protect rights and reflect the aspirations of the people of Sierra Leone,” Miller said.
Sierra Leone’s President Julius Maada Bio was sworn in for a second term on June 28, hours after the electoral commission announced its victory in the first round with more than 56 percent of the vote. This result was flatly rejected by the main opposition candidate, Samura Kamara, who assured that the figures were not “credible”.
Although Bio defended his victory as “incontestable”, the Office for African Affairs of the US State Department already shared “the concerns expressed by electoral observation groups about the transparency of the recount process.”
The vote and, especially, the repercussions that it may have at a political and economic level, will mark the future in the short term in the country, which aspires to consolidate the democratic advances obtained in the two decades that have passed since the end of the civil war ( 1991-2002), which left around 120,000 dead.
