After a successful referendum poll held in December, Rwandans will next month return to the polls for local government elections. The elections, which will take place right from the village level, will be held in February and March. The New Times’ Felly Kimenyi and Samantha Teta spoke to the Executive Secretary of the National Electoral Commission, Charles Munyaneza, about preparations, the recent referendum, among other electoral issues.

Below are the excerpts:

Can you give us a recap of the just-concluded referendum process?

Everybody is aware that the country ended the year on a high after the referendum that we had on December 17 and 18 in which Rwandans voted overwhelmingly in favour of the amendment of the Constitution.

Over 98.3 per cent of Rwandans, both in the Diaspora and within the country, voted in favour of the amendment but, most amazingly, not only were the voters happy with the outcome but also the process itself was very smooth. The elections were held in a calm and transparent manner.

That gave us the necessary encouragement to organise other elections that are coming up, against the background that Rwandans have reached a stage of owning the electoral process, which means political maturity is taking root.

On each polling day, we see very many voters turning up at polling stations, voting peacefully and peacefully accepting the outcome of the electoral process as it happened with the referendum.

How do you gauge the referendum process against other recently conducted elections?

We think that the referendum process was a very big success despite the fact that some people were worried about the time frame within which we were supposed to organise the election and manage the referendum itself.I think it was the first time the electoral commission managed to organise a national election within a period of less than two weeks but both the commission and Rwandans proved that, if the country is ready to do something, it can be done, especially when it is within the interest of the country and the people.

You talk of political maturity that you witnessed especially in the referendum polls, what are the benchmarks against which you make that judgement?

A number of things, and one of those is the way people perceived and understood the referendum electoral process.

You remember when people started requesting for the amendment of the Constitution, they eagerly followed up on the process at Parliament and Cabinet level until we were requested to organise these elections.

That shows that Rwandans have reached a stage where they know what they want and, once they know what they want, they are ready to ensure it succeeds and to us that is a sign that the country is maturing politically and the people are maturing in terms of democracy and choosing the type of leadership they want.

Secondly, the way people voted, most especially the peaceful nature of the electoral process, is very important and that shows the maturity of Rwandans. You know that in many countries, especially in developing countries, election time is not the best period for citizens.

Yet, on the Election Day, the country was in a celebratory mood and not because they had won or that there was one side winning and the other losing, but Rwandans looked at themselves as winners because of the peaceful nature of the process.

Some international actors made allegations against Rwanda for giving less time for deploying observers, having no time to sensitise the people about the process, what can you say about this?

First of all, Rwanda is not the only country that has managed elections in such a (short) period, especially when you crosscheck with those western countries, we have always seen referenda being called in one week. For example, the referendum in Greece, but nobody has ever complained about such.

So, if they others why not Rwanda? More so, referenda are not like other elections, it depends on the issue at hand and the urgency with which it must be taken into account.

Secondly, these international observers, if they had wanted to come and observe our elections, they should have done it because they were following up the process and we even took time to invite observers, we also invited all embassies and high commissions accredited to Rwanda to send their own representatives as they have been doing, and some of them observed the process.

So, I think it was not a question of time but maybe they were not sure that we could do it.

About sensitising people, there was not much to sensitise them about. Rwandans were ready for the referendum; after all, they are the ones who had been requesting for it for months.

So, it wasn’t a short period of time even terms of the sensitisation because you sensitise people on something that is new to them but the review of this Constitution was not new to them.

If there had been little time for sensitisation we wouldn’t have had that kind of voter turn out.

Basically, the sensitisation we had to do was about issues like the format of the ballot paper.

Now about the forthcoming local government elections, can you bring us up to speed on the process and where you are now?

As we were preparing for the referendum, we were at the same time preparing for these (grassroots) elections.

This is something we were telling the people because we knew that this year we would be having local government elections which we last had in 2011.

We knew definitely that in March or February 2016 we were going to have these elections, so as we talk now, we are done with voter registration because the voter register that we used for the referendum is the same voter register we are going to use for these local government elections.

The voter cards that we issued ( for the referendum) are the same that voters will use in these elections. So I can say we are set for the local government elections.

Concerning budget, we had budgeted for these elections in this financial year and the Ministry ( of Finance and Economic Planning) has already given us the biggest chunk of the funds we requested.

We have close to 70,000 electoral volunteers who were used for the referendum and these are the same volunteers that are going to facilitate the local government elections.

So, the fact that we had the referendum in December and we are going to have the local government elections in February, just some two months in between, to us is an advantage because whatever we were preparing for the referendum is also going to be used in the local government elections.

That’s why from January 5 to 15 we are receiving candidatures for district councilors and from the reports we are getting, the exercise is picking up and I would say we are making very good progress.

We are preparing the regulations and instructions that are going to guide the polls. We have also started sensitising the voters. We know people have spent time thinking about the referendum, so we are aware that we need to put in a lot of effort to make them understand that having the referendum is not the end of the process.

Many Rwandans thought that the referendum was the most important electoral duty they were going to do in their lives, especially the young ones who were voting for the first time.

Every year we have got about 200,000 people voting for their first time and since the last elections we had in 2013 we have had about 600,000 new voters; so all these need education.

Secondly, people who voted in the referendum thought that maybe they were done but we are reminding them that voting in the referendum is not the end of the story. We need local leaders who will support the process.

Another thing is, when people voted in the referendum, some thought they had voted the President of the Republic, which is wrong. People may not even be aware that we have elections in 2017 but we have elections next year of the President.

So we are doing all these things sensitising people about the local government elections but also reminding them that we have elections in the future and these local leaders must be there to support national leaders, including the President.

We had a very good referendum but, again, our minds must be reset to have very successful local government elections because this is the basis of national development.

What is the roadmap for the local government elections?

The process is long, that is why we are going to have two months of elections.

Within those two months, we shall have electoral activities taking place because of the number of elections that have to be held. One, we are going to have elections for grassroots leaders and here I mean village coordinators and their executive committees, then we are going to vote for cell councils, then the sector and district councils.

We shall also vote for executive committees and councilors for the City of Kigali, then elections for special interest groups’ representatives; the youth, women and people with disabilities through their councils.

So there are a number of elections that are spread during that time of two months but I would maybe highlight a few dates of important elections that will take place.

The first election will be held on February 8 and these will be national elections of universal suffrage where everyone above 18 years of age should be voting where we shall be voting our cell executive committees and cell councils.

This election will be done by lining up behind preferred candidates.

The other election is on February 22, here again all of us shall be turning up to vote for the district council from councilors who will come from sectors.

On this day, all registered voters will be eligible to vote and this election will be done by casting secret ballots. It will be a secret ballot just like how the referendum was done.

Then, on February 27, we shall vote for the district executive committees. This is where the mayors and vice mayors will be elected from the district councils.

On March 22, we shall have elections for the City of Kigali mayor and his or her executive committee. Then the next election shall be for the women in the national women council, then the youth and people with disabilities. It is a long journey which we have just started and a very important one.

It had been said that mayors were supposed to have wound up their mandate in December; how true is this and, if not true, when does their mandate end?

Let me remind people that there is no specific law that states that mayors should cease being mayors or that councilors should cease being councilors by December or by end of December.

These mayors were sworn in march 2011 and five years will elapse in March 2016, so they are legally still in office and whatever they are doing is legal but for purposes of elections, it is expected that some of them will seek reelection so they cannot campaign when they are still in office.

That is why the Ministry of Local Government comes up with regulations on when these people cease to be in office to allow time for electoral processes.

It is also in line with the electoral calendar because they wouldn’t have left office before we started the process, especially this one of receiving candidates, approving them so as long as we haven’t published the list of approved candidates, they can still be in office.

The list will be out latest January 29 so they can still be in the office till then but the Ministry of Local Government will issue an official announcement on that.

About the budget, could you tell us how much this will cost?

We submitted an estimated budget of about five billion francs.

The Ministry of Finance has so far given us 85 per cent of what were supposed to get and the 15 percent we shall get in due course.

I want to make it clear some people think that we may have used the funds for local government elections for the referendum, but it is not true, the referendum had its own budget and we got the funds separately.

Any financial challenges amid delays in the disbursement of the full amount you requested for?

In a country like ours, there are very many competing priorities, you cannot get all you want financially, because there are many national needs for a country that is rebuilding itself, so what we do we try to work within those limits, which is why, for example ,we use election volunteers. In other countries those people are paid.

So, even though we may not have all the funds needed we are not crippled, we can make do with what we have as we have continually done in the past. By the way, we used to rely on foreign funding to manage elections but since 2008 we stopped that.

We are relying 100% on government funding to make sure that we manage our elections because they have now become a sovereign activity. So that’s why we try as much as possible to use the funds that we get from government.

In other countries people don’t complain about election money because they can get it from donors but we think elections in Rwanda should be managed using national resources.

This is because we had a bad experience in 2003 as these donors had pledged to give us money to manage the elections but didn’t deliver at the last minute.

Therefore, we learned a lesson that we can sustain ourselves and that is why we try to work within our means.

Some mayors have not been effective in executing their duties for this cycle that is ending, with some getting arrested over corruption. Is effectiveness and integrity some of the things considered during the vetting exercise?

First of all, it’s not the electoral commission that vets candidates. Once we receive candidates and approve of whether a person fits the criteria to be a candidate or not, we just look at the paper-work provided to us as stated by law: If he or she is a registered voter, a Rwandan, 21 years of age to qualify for being a councilor and 25 to be a mayor and, has the candidate been convicted of a crime and imprisoned for a period longer than six months?

During the period of campaign people get to know who is who among contestants, their level integrity, so the voters have the vetting powers. So when it is polling day, they go and they decide depending on how they perceive the candidates.

Any other comments?

Going back to the referendum, I think we as Rwandans are proud of how peacefully the process was conducted. We had a very good year 2015. It ended with people celebrating.

At the electoral commission we are happy that we were able to manage those very important and strategic elections.

For 2016, we have entered into another electoral phase and our message to the people is to take these elections as serious as they did the referendum and as seriously as they anticipate the presidential elections next year.

Elections are the basis of national development, unity and reconciliation. These leaders have a very significant role in rebuilding this country and that’s why we are taking it very seriously and asking Rwandans to take them very seriously to build a very strong foundation for the development of the country.

editorial@newtimes.co.rw