Tuesday, 05 June 2012
Bridget Di Certo and Vong Sokheng
Phnom Penh Post
Votes are
tallied at a polling station in Phnom Penh on Sunday following commune
elections. Photograph: Heng Chivoan/Phnom Penh Post
Although the ruling Cambodian People’s Party is touting a landslide win
in Sunday’s commune elections, support for it and junior partners
Funcinpec and the Norodom Ranariddh Party actually slipped as a
percentage of the popular vote – dropping to 68 per cent this year from
74 per cent in 2007.
Support for opposition parties, meanwhile,
jumped to 31 per cent in the third mandate from 25 per cent in 2007,
according to leaked results from CPP headquarters.
The results,
assembled by CPP commune chiefs and councillors, show the CPP sweeping
to victory with roughly 62 per cent of the popular vote.
The SRP picked up 20.8 per cent, while royalist parties Funcinpec and NRP picked up 3.9 and 2.9 per cent, respectively.
Newcomer
HRP earned 9.8 per cent of the popular vote, performing particularly
well in Prey Veng, where it secured 23 per cent of the vote, and Kampong
Cham, with 17 per cent.
The SRP performed well in Phnom Penh and Kampong Thom, picking up 29 and 27 per cent of the vote.
According
to the results, the CPP performed strongly in the coastal regions of
Kep, Preah Sihanouk and Koh Kong, with negligible wins for any other
parties in those provinces.
CPP spokesman Cheam Yeap said the
initial polls by the CPP usually matched the final results announced by
the NEC, as the political party used the same calculations as the
electoral body.
“We have a mass winning election in which we [CPP] won 1,592 of the total 1,633 communes nationwide,” Cheam Yeap said.
The
National Election Committee has said it will not announce official
results until June 24, and results may even be delayed beyond that, as
provincial election committees are responsible for resolving all
election complaints before the numbers become valid.
“The commune
election committees will take three days for counting the votes and
then will send to the Provincial Election Committee, which will need
five days to examine the results and must resolve all complaints before
sending to the NEC,” Tep Nyth said.
“The political party that
wins the majority of seats will then appoint the chief of the
commune/sangkat, and the political party winning the next highest votes
will appoint the first or second commune chief, depending on numbers,”
he added.
The Cambodian formula, colloquially known as the “the
highest-average formula”, means the top vote-getters gain a number of
seats greater than their percentage of the vote, while “losers” receive
considerably fewer seats than their vote tally might suggest.
It’s a formula observers have said leaves little room for political participation by smaller parties.
“It
is a technical formula that caused lots of controversy in 1998 when
they put this formula in the election law. The formula is very much in
favour of the winner, and the winner will take more seats,” Koul Panha
said.
It is due to this “unique” formula, as Koul Panha described
it, that in 2007, SRP ended up with just 23.42 per cent of commune
seats in the Kingdom despite winning 25.19 per cent of the vote.
The discrepancies are accentuated by big wins and losses in particular communes.
For
example, the NRP garnered 8.11 per cent of the popular vote in 2007,
but earned just 3.74 per cent of the seats – a prospect the HRP will
face despite storming into the political sphere with 9.8 per cent of the
popular vote.
“This is why in the National Assembly, the CPP
has 58 per cent of the vote but 70 per cent of the seats,” Koul Panha
said. “Many people suggest using the formula used during the UNTAC time,
because it is fairer for the small opposition parties, and in Thailand,
they use a proportional formula where if you get 60 per cent of the
vote, you get 60 per cent of the seats.”
In 2007, despite winning only 60.82 per cent of the popular vote, the CPP secured 70.40 per cent of commune seats.
The
CPP scooped up 62 per cent of the popular vote in Sunday’s elections in
which about 64 per cent of eligible voters cast a ballot.
Monitors
reported up to a 20 per cent drop in voter turnout for the commune
elections, however, Koul Panha said this should not be attributed to
apathy.
“People do think the commune elections are important, but
maybe not that important that they would sacrifice time and money going
to vote,” he said.
“The national election is a different thing
and more people are interested,” he said, adding it was “very common” to
get a lower turnout at the commune level.
To contact the reporters on this story: Bridget Di Certo at bridget.dicerto@phnompenhpost.com
Vong Sokheng at sokheng.vong@phnompenhpost.com
1 comment:
31% of voteers support opposition parties and 68% turn out votes in 2012 councils election from 76%.
Those previous voters decided not to cast their ballots this year are more likely not CPP supporters but feels no enthusiastic to vote for oppositions since either:
1. They don't think their votes will have any impact.
2. Their names were wronlgy not in the list.
3. They are not happy with opposition parties but they don't like CPP.
4. They are not paying attention to the politic and tired.
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