The PA leadership (Fatah) has never showed a decisive and clear commitment in organizing new election, both on local and general level. Any democratic system should be characterized by fair, democratic and periodic elections, giving to the population the opportunity to choose its national representatives periodically. Since the first general election, held in January 1996, the Palestinian leadership has no longer been subjected to this kind of democratic assessment in order to evaluate the real capabilities of the Palestinian governors, their effective consensus as well as their accountability among the Palestinian society. In accordance with the Oslo Agreements, the current mandate of the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) would have expired in May 1999.
All of the Palestinian Local Councils are appointed, not elected. Consequently, it comes to be interpreted as a lack of democratic legitimacy and a shortage of accountability towards the citizens. This policy has been also accompanied by the stagnated political process between Israel and the Palestinians. Actually, the elections have also been dramatically obstructed by the awful Israeli occupation throughout the Occupied Palestinian Territories. The sieges and closures imposed everywhere, the ongoing construction of the “apartheid” wall, the growing deployment of Israeli military forces as well as the continuing enlargement of the settlement program, especially across the West Bank territory, have certainly had a remarkable impact on this topic. Furthermore, it is undeniable that the inception of the current Al-Aqsa Intifada, sparkled in September 2000, has even played a key role in preventing the holding of general and local elections.
 In this scenario, the failure to hold local and general elections might be likely explained as an attempt to keep the political forces of opposition away from any governmental process and activity, even at local level. The fact that both secular and Islamic movements have expressed their desire to take part to the elections as well as their quickly growing consensus within the Palestinian people, has widened the PA leaders’ fear of losing prominent governmental positions, being aware of the erosion of their support within the civil society.
The Palestinian society desperately supports the necessity of holding fair and democratic election processes, both on local and general level. Even though the enormous disappointment and lack of confidence towards the present Palestinian leadership, Palestinian people firmly recognize the great significance of fair elections and their unimaginable benefits to the Palestinian Authority’s stability as well as to the creation of a viable, democratic and independent Palestinian State. As showed below, the Palestinian population’s demand for new election is extremely wide-spread throughout the OPT.
Main reasons explaining the ongoing corruption (“An-Najah National University” September 2004).
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Palestinian Corruption a Setback to the Two-State Solutionposted Feb 3, 2011 12:40 PM by PNIC Staff [ updated Feb 28, 2011 9:43 PM ] |