Another Look at the Election

I recently read an article on the disproportion of the number of votes cast for the ruling party and the number of seats they will get. Let’s look at the rough numbers. About 58% voted for the CPP and 42% voted for the opposition parties. The CPP will get an estimated 90 seats or 73% of the assembly seats, only 33 or 27% of all seats will go to four other parties. There seems to be a glaring imbalance as the author of that piece I read seemed to imply (if I remember correctly).

But that opinion would leave out any consideration of the electoral system in place. Cambodia uses the proportionate system for allocating assembly seats by party lists. In that system the number of seats won may not correspond to the share of the overall vote. Here is why: each voting district is allocated a certain number of seats, a few even with only one seat although that district has only a small population, say a hundred. In this case the party with the majority of votes gets the seat. Fortunately, there are only a handful of those districts.

In very populous districts such as Kompong Cham the parties will be allocated seats in line with their share of the popular vote. In many cases there will be a small number of seats left over (‘overhangs’) that will be allocated by the system of the highest average a party received.

Let's take Kompong Cham:

CPP : 409 766 / 51,28%
SRP : 211 934 / 26,52%
HRP : 72 725 / 9,10

There are 18 seats for the district, 9 of which will go to the CPP, 4 will go to the SRP, and 1 will go to the HRP, which is a total of 14 with 4 seats to be assigned according the principle of the highest average (d’Hondt system).

CPP quotient = 40,977
SRP quotient = 42,387
HRP quotient = 36,362

So the next seat will go to the SRP. The following quotients will look like this:

CPP = 40.977
SRP = 35,322
HRP = 36,362

Accordingly, the following seat will go to the CPP.

CPP = 37, 251
SRP = 35,322
HRP = 36,362

The next seat will go to the CPP.

CPP = 34, 148
SRP = 35,322
HRP = 36,322

So this last seat will go to the HRP, which brings the total seats won by each party in Kompong Cham to:

CPP = 11 seats = 61.1% of the seats
SRP = 5 seats = 27.8% of the seats
HRP = 2 seats = 11.1% of the seats

The more votes a party gets the greater will be the highest average, in other words, this system favors the bigger parties.

This is an electoral system used in many democracies in one form or another, either as a stand-alone system or in combination with another system.

The U. S. has a two-party system with a clear winner-takes-it-all formula, so it is straight-forward but can also lead to results which do not reflect the popular vote, especially with their Electoral College in the presidential elections. People vote for candidates, not for parties.

The British have the same system (without the Electoral College) but basically a three-party system. The winning candidate might actually have only won a minority of the votes. People also vote only for candidates and not parties

The French have, in my view, the best system, albeit very expensive. There a candidate must reach a clear absolute majority, that is 50%+1, to win. France boasts of a multitude of parties, all of them fielding candidates. If no candidate reaches the 50%+1, there are run-off elections between the first and second candidates.

Germany has a very complicated mix of systems where people vote for both a direct candidate by majority vote and a party list, which is then allocated seats according to the d’Hondt system. So people actually have two votes.

So if you want to go to the trouble of figuring out how the CPP won more seats than their share of the votes you can do this by following the formula:

Seats by share of vote + overhanging seats assigned by formula below

Total votes for the party / ( number of original seats assigned according to share of votes + 1 ) = quotient.

But you can rest assured there is nothing wrong with the distribution of the seats per party according to the published election results.

That does not, however, in any way say anything about the claim of the opposition that the election as such was fraudulent. The fact that the NEC did not publish its reasons for their clear and very quick dismissal of the SRP’s complaints is very troublesome and might lead neutral observers to believe that there actually weren’t any real legal arguments but that the whole affair will be resolved behind closed doors. That, of course, leaves a very bitter taste and reflects very badly on the CPP.

Opposition Parties’ Complaints to the UN and EU

Now this strikes me as somewhat weird. Why would the opposition front lodge their complaints with the UN and the EU?

Sure, both the UN and the EU sent observers to see whether the electoral process went according to democratic norms and standards; but that’s all they were – observers. And it is absolute news to me that they would have some jurisdiction over Cambodian elections.

We read that the NEC roundly dismissed all complaints, which doesn’t seem to be too much in compliance with their charter. One would believe an investigation would at least take a couple of months. So something is foul in the state Denmark, to paraphrase Shakespeare.

It appears as though the whole state apparatus now deals with Sam Rainsy and his followers as bothersome gnats rather than serious opponents, which must enrage someone like Sam Rainsy who thinks of himself as the only person capable of building a new Cambodia and far superior to anybody else in the country. This most likely only strengthens his determination to boycott the opening session of the National Assembly. And this probably also accounts for his reaching actions such as the complaint to the UN and EU. He is only making a nuisance of himself, nothing else. It is rather sad, really. If he believes this is publicity in the Western world, he is greatly mistaken. Just read the world press. There is hardly ever any mention of Cambodia to begin with, let alone his complaints about rigged elections, whether substantive or not. Look how much press coverage the far more serious Zimbabwan situation got. This is yesterday’s news.

If he wants to achieve at least some progress with his agenda, Sam Rainsy must learn to work within the system.

Oops

There I was writing about world leaders shunning the King when the Chinese news agency published this photo.




So, I apologize, Your Majesty. But that official celebration still is an injudicious act. A nice telegram and a personal message and a visit by your father would be more than enough. You have to know where your good friends are. In the picture you are shaking the hands of one of them.

The Odd Royals

Just so we would know for sure there is something wrong with the royal family, the King has now ordered a planning committee to prepare for the celebration of the 60th anniversary of, yes it is true, North Korea.

I guess we all know that Sihanouk was a strange bed-fellow in his time with his seesaw politics that laid the breeding ground for the plight of his 'beloved children' – the Cambodian people.

But that his son now sees fit to honor a despotic regime, a pariah of the world, most aptly shows that something got lost along the way in the royal genetic line, as his half-brothers Ranariddh and Thomico have shown more than once with their past pronouncements.

No wonder nobody talks to him at the Olympic opening ceremony where he was sitting next to Laura and George Bush and Vladimir Putin. Not only is the PM shunned by world leaders, now it it is the King too. With this kind of official action he only underscores the reasons.

The Boycott Is On

According to Sam Rainsy who held a press conference with the other losing parties on Friday, they will boycott the first session of the assembly on August 24, when all deputies are to be sworn in.

The reason given for their action is that the election was rigged, a sham, and that more than 1 million voters were disenfranchised, although they had previously claimed more than 2 million in Phnom Penh alone. Now which is it? They go on to say that the National Election Committee cannot be trusted as they are in the pockets of the CPP. The opposition parties did file their complaints there and even filed a complaint in court against several local commune chiefs for forgery.

Of course, anybody has a right to claim that there were irregularities, but they also need to come up with concrete evidence that can stand up in court. Yes, we know Cambodian courts are not independent and will do whatever the ruling party tells them. Nevertheless, wouldn’t it stand to reason for the opposition parties to follow proper procedures. Shouldn’t they follow democratic and legal principles in pursuing their claims? Shouldn’t they act in a way that clearly distinguishes them from the ruling party?

Now, of course, the question arises whether a boycott of the opening session follows democratic principles. In my opinion it does not. Real democrats fight back with democratic weapons, that is, with their votes, public statements, policy proposals, etc. To boycott the opening sessions deprives them of their right to occupy their seats as elected representatives of their constituents. The constitution, and mind you, I am no constitutional expert, provides for the swearing-in of all deputies. If some deputies forego that swearing-in they lose that seat, regardless of Ms Mochua’s announcement that they are not abandoning their seats through their boycott.

There is nothing in the constitution covering such an eventuality because nobody ever thought this would happen when the constitution was drafted with the help of legal experts from many democratic countries, including France, the U. K, other European countries, and the U. S. Because the history of modern democracy has shown that the elected representatives always take their seats and then move forward in parliamentary sessions. If corrections are to be made for irregularities the seats in question can be re-assigned to another party later. That happens all the time in other countries. There is also the possibility of holding by-elections in disputed districts.

This can all be done while the new assembly goes about its work and the new government takes over, never mind that it is still the same PM. The opposition’s plan for a boycott is utterly undemocratic and one can only say, ‘Shame on them!’

The opposition knows and has granted as much that the CPP has won a clear majority even taking into account a correction for irregularities. They published a so-called ‘Sensitivity Analysis’ which outlines a revised tally of votes. The CPP would have won 77 instead of 90 seats; Funcinpec’s would remain at 2.

The objective behind this appears to be to break the CPP’s 2/3-majority they would get if they get their 90 seats. As they had announced, the CPP and Funcinpec are planning to continue their coalition. But even 79 seats are just shy of a 2/3 majority. Personally, I don’t have a problem with that. A 2/3-majority is definitely unhealthy in any democracy, the more so in an emerging democracy as in Cambodia. But the fact remains this needs to be done with truly democratic means. Preliminary results were published by the NEC this Saturday. The deadline for complaints is after 72 hours. Let’s hope the opposition parties come to their senses and abandon their destructive boycott.