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Mali: Successful parliamentary election solidifies country’s transition to democracy
The party of Mali’s new president and its political allies have won a comfortable majority in a parliamentary election intended to seal to a return to democratic civilian rule following an army coup in March 2012.
Completion of the parliamentary election presents the country with an opportunity to heal and enable its citizens to rebuild and in addition develop the once lawless desert north, where Islamists seized control in the aftermath of the coup.
External military intervention helped drive the al Qaeda-linked fighters from northern towns, clearing the way for a presidential election won by Ibrahim Boubacar Keita.
In preliminary results for the parliamentary vote, Keita’s RPM party finished first after the second of two rounds of voting, securing 61 of a total of 147 seats in parliament, according to his chief of staff, Mahamadou Camara.
Adema, the RPM’s principal ally, finished second with 20 seats, according to Abdoulaye Maiga, a member of the party’s leadership, while smaller parties backing Keita also won seats.
The URD – the party of Soumaila Cisse, who lost the presidential runoff to Keita and is now positioning himself as the leading opposition figure – claimed 18 of a total of 24 seats for opposition parties, a party spokesman said.
Results by constituency were announced on state television but still need to be ratified by Mali’s constitutional court.
