September issue of ARB on the Gulf

The new Arab Reform Bulletin is out.

The articles this time around are on the Sunni armed groups in Iraq, the aftermath of the Moroccan elections, the upcoming Presidential election in Lebanon.

The most interesting part, in my view this time is the rare and very interesting focus on the Arab Peninsula and reform, one article on the upcoming Shura council elections in Oman on October 27, by Rafiah al Talei, and another on the general trends in terms of elections and reform within the Gulf States by David Mikosz where he shows that high turnout, as in most countries are related to elections that are looked upon as fair, and were the elected body is producing results. The examples of Qatar and Bahrain follow this pattern with 75-85 % turnout for the first advisory council election in Qatar 1999 and 84 % in the referendum that created the first elected parliament in 2003, the second advisory council election in 2003, only managed to galvanize a turnout of 30 % due to the fact that the outgoing body, was not viewed to have any particular influence. Bahrain had a 90 % turnout to a referendum on the national charter in 2001, when the reform elements of the charter proved less than satisfying , both the electorate and the opposition showed it´s displeasure by not turning up for the next parliamentary elections (53 % turnout).

One of the ways of ensuring that the populace feel secure about fair elections is in Mikosz view to introduce nonpartisan election commissions, the only country country however that has such a system in the Peninsula is Yemen, and Kuwait is viewed as having the most efficient election administration of the region, despite the fact that it´s administered by the Interior Ministry. My view on this, very biased by the fact that the strategy of creating a election commission was used by the Egyptian regime, as a tactic to strip the Egyptian judges of their duty to supervise and guarantee the fairness of the elections, and that the makeup of the election commission, in no way can be considered non-partisan in the Egyptian case, i am extremely reluctant to see this as something of a universal antidote to reluctant semi authoritarian democrats, who wants to refurbish themselves in the garnment of reform and democratization.

This is the articles in the September edition

Iraq: The Politics of Sunni Armed Groups
Muhammad Abu Rumman

Morocco: The Elections Are Over; Let Voter Education Begin
Asmae Otmani

Lebanon: Scenarios for the Presidential Election
Sarkis Naoum

Oman: Shura Council Elections and Aspirations for Change
Rafiah al-Talei

Arabian Peninsula: The Importance of Electoral Administration
David Mikosz