Ivorian parliamentary election, 2011

The parliamentary elections in Ivory Coast in 2011 took place on December 11, 2011 and ended with a clear victory of the party Rassemblement of Républicains the reigning President, Alassane Ouattara. Almost 1000 candidates and 35 parties competed for the 255 seats in parliament.

Background

These were the first elections after the month-long government crisis 2010/2011, in which about 3,000 people lost their lives and were forced to flee more than one million. The crisis was triggered by the refusal of the then incumbent President Laurent Gbagbo to recognize his election defeat to Alassane Ouattara in the presidential election of 2010. Two weeks before the 2011 parliamentary elections, the Ivorian authorities had extradited the former President Gbagbo to the International Criminal Court (ICC). In protest against the extradition Gbagbo his supporters boycotted the elections.

Results

On the basis of this boycott not seat the party won Gbagbo, the Ivorian Popular Front ( FPI), in Parliament. The party of the ruling president Alassane Ouattara on the other hand, the Rassemblement of Républicains ( RDR) could win 127 of the 255 seats in the Parliament. The second strongest faction in parliament was the Parti Démocratique de Côte d' Ivoire ( PDCI ) with 77 seats. The PDCI had in the ballot of the presidential elections 2010 supports Ouattara against Gbagbo. Due to the boycott of the FPI, the turnout was only 36 percent from about five million eligible voters.

The allocation of a seat is still controversial, because the candidate had died.

The official announcement of the results took place on 8 March 2012. Subsequently, the government Soro III declared their resignation.

Course

The election was peaceful. The turnout was low not only because of the boycott of the party Gbagbo, Ouattara strongholds in the held to the participation in limits. However, it was much higher than in the general election 2000/2001, in which, however, only 33 percent had participated.