The African Union will this week suggest that Madagascar delay a general election planned for December 15, a senior South African official said on Sunday.
Kingsley Mamabolo said a letter would be sent to
Antananarivo this week requesting Madagascan President Marc Ravalomanana to delay the poll ”in the interests of democracy.”
”President Ravalomanana told the AU troika here in October that everything was in place for free and fair elections on December 15,” Mamabolo said.
”It appears, after talking to representatives of the opposition Arema Party that this is not the case. There is still arrest and intimidation of opposition players,” he said.
”In the light of the this the AU feels it better to delay the election.”
Mamabolo said if elections would go ahead on the Indian Ocean island, the AU would probably still send observers, with European Union observers already gathering there.
Pierrot Rajaonarivelo, a leader of the opposition Arema Party and the country’s former finance minister, saw President Thabo Mbeki on November 22, together with representatives of two other AU
members, Mozambique and Zambia.
Rajaonarivelo represents the internal wing of Arema, the party of former president Didier Ratsiraka, who now lives in exile in France after finally acknowledging defeat by Ravalomanana in presidential elections a year ago.
The AU has refused to recognise the Ravalomanana government and has barred Madagascar from membership in the AU, which replaced the Organisation for African Unity in July this year.
At its inaugural summit in Durban the AU called on Ravalomanana to submit himself to new elections.
Ravalomanana said in October, however, that the December 15 general elections showed his country had solved its own problems.
He expressed confidence that the AU would recognise Madagascar. South African Foreign Minister Nkosazana Zuma had said the AU would make its decision based on talks with both Ravalomanana and representatives of Arema. – Sapa-AFP