Newsletter No. 255
April 29, 2006

 

JAPAN PROVIDES ELECTION SUPPORT FOR MAURITANIA

Shingetsu Newsletter No. 57 in August 2005 briefly discussed the Japanese government and media reaction to the coup in Mauritania. I expressed some disappointment that little attention was paid to that event.

This week, MOFA has finally brought up that issue with an announcement that Japan would provide some money to help Mauritania carry out new elections. This money will be channeled through the UNDP.

The August 2005 military coup put an end to the 21-year rule of Maaouya Ould Sid Ahmed Taya, and was generally popular with domestic public opinion. The leader of the coup, Colonel Ely Ould Mohamed Vall, promised to restore democracy within two years. However, the African Union has stuck by its rules and has suspended Mauritania’s activities in the organization until democracy is actually restored.

An Australian company called Woodside Petroleum discovered the country’s first oil field in 2001 at an offshore site called Chinguetti. However, in February of this year, the regime of Mohamed Vall denounced the earlier agreement with Woodside. After tough negotiating, the two parties appeared to have resolved their dispute at the end of March. As a result, Mauritania’s economic growth is expected to surge by about 20% this year with the new oil revenues.

The first customer for Mauritania’s oil has been China. In fact, China has bought all the Mauritanian oil produced this month.

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EMERGENCY GRANT AID FOR THE ELECTORAL PROCESS IN THE ISLAMIC REPUBLIC OF MAURITANIA
April 25, 2006

1) On April 25 (Tue), the Government of Japan decided to provide emergency grant aid totaling about 1,140,000 dollars (about 133 million yen) to the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) to assist the smooth implementation of a series of elections to be held in the Islamic Republic of Mauritania. The contribution will be allocated for part of the expenditure necessary to support a series of elections in the country beginning with a national referendum for constitutional amendment scheduled for June 24.

2) In Mauritania, the armed forces, which seized power in August last year, established a transitional administration, and since October consultations have been held with the attendance of those concerned from wide-ranging organizations including each political party and citizens' group in the country. As a result, the Government of Mauritania, based on a democratization schedule decided on at these consultations, set up an independent national electoral commission, and is preparing to conduct a series of elections starting from the Constitutional referendum in June this year to the Presidential elections in March next year.

3) Japan's support for this electoral process in Mauritania covers the Constitutional referendum, Municipal elections, Legislative elections and Presidential elections which is important for progress of democratization and stability in Mauritania, and consequently for the peace, stability and democratization in the West African Region.

4) Japan has proactively exerted efforts for the consolidation of peace in Africa, regarding it as one of the pillars for supporting Africa, by holding, for example, the TICAD (Tokyo International Conference on African Development) Conference on Consolidation of Peace in February this year. This support for the electoral process in Mauritania is part of this effort.