Observations of an Expat: Not So Free or Fair Elections

BY TOM ARMS

Elections are great. They are the cornerstone of liberal democracies. They ensure that the government has the support of the people so that the country can move forward.

Elections are great… IF (notice the capital letters) they are free and fair. Otherwise, they are an exercise in political hypocrisy designed to sacrifice the national interest to special interest groups—a sad, bad and ultimately dangerous road for the guilty politicos and the country they claim to represent.

There are several elements that contribute to making elections free and fair, including Multiple parties representing a variety of political views; a free press; open debate; secret ballots;  transparency in polling procedures; an absence of foreign interference and an inclusive structure which ensures participation by all members of society.

Of course, the absence of any or all of the above conditions doesn’t stop the less democratic rulers from staging polls and claiming the mantle of respectability that elections bestow. They are a sham; easily exposed as such and suffer the consequences accordingly. It would probably have been better for the rulers concerned to have not bothered with the vote in the first place.

The most recent dramatic example of a sham election is Belarus where Alexander Lukashenko claimed 80 per cent of the vote. There is no free press in Belarus.

Virtually all of Lukashenko’s political opponents were thrown into jail before the election. Anti-Lukashenko rallies were banned. The ballot boxes were almost certainly stuffed, that is if they even bothered to count them. The result has been national chaos as tens of thousands have risen up to demand the end to Lukashenko’s 26-year-old dictatorship. Thousands have been beaten, arrested and thrown into detention. The electoral crisis in Belarus has sparked a foreign policy crisis as The European Union supports the Belarussian opposition and Vladimir Putin warns Brussels to back off.

Putin’s electoral record is also heavily tarnished. The restrictions are nothing like those in Belarus but “Russia,” as Melbourne University reports, “does democracy differently.” For a start, freedom of press is a rapidly disappearing asset in the land of the Muscovites. But more importantly, is the handling of opposition candidates. If they become too troublesome they are imprisoned on trumped-up charges or simply “eliminated.” Elimination was the fate of liberal politician Boris Nemtsov who was shot and killed on a Moscow bridge in 2015. This week we learned that the oft-arrested and imprisoned Alexei Navalny is in a coma in Siberia after drinking, what his family claim, was a poisoned cup of tea.

Other countries’ claims to the mantle of electoral respectability are also suspect. Hungary’s Viktor Orban has described his country’s system as an “illiberal” or “managed” democracy. That is a generous self-assessment. Electoral observers from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) were less charitable. They pointed out that the campaign literature of the Orban’s ruling Fidesz Party was paid out of government funds; opposition access to the media was restricted and there was limited scope for political debate.

Of course, the world’s attention is currently focused on the American elections, not least because of the American claim to be the world’s showcase for democracy. There have been previously expressed doubts as to the efficacy of those claims, but never more than in 2020. Political pundits claim that the American electoral map is now spattered with Republican-organised gerrymandered constituencies to reduce the voting power of the Democrat-leaning ethnic minorities. Donald Trump’s attacks on the media (purveyors of “fake news” and “enemies of the people”) can be said to have undermined freedom of the press and there is the issue of Russian interference which refuses to go away despite Trump’s “hoax” claims.

Perhaps most worrying is the president’s implication that the Democrats will attempt to steal the White House through electoral fraud. He presents no evidence to support this which leads to the growing belief that Donald Trump is laying the groundwork for a groundless Republican challenge to the November election result. This belief was given added credence recently when the White House spokesperson refused to say whether or not Donald Trump would leave the White House if he lost the election.

READ ALSO: Observations of an Expat: I am an Immigrant

Trump’s supporters equate support for their president with the national interest. The danger is that the cult of Trump has grown so powerful that it could damage America’s electoral process with a knock-on effect elsewhere in the world.

World Review

Biden is old. Biden is slow. Biden is gaffe-prone. Biden is also a thoroughly decent public servant. In the last respect, he is in complete contrast to the current occupant of the White House who has misused his position to the benefit of the interests of himself, his family and friends.

Has either actively supported—or at the very least enabled—division, racism and misogyny; alienated long-term allies; completely mishandled a pandemic; ridden roughshod over the rule of law and the US constitution; destroyed families, cosied up to dictators and right-wing populists; destroyed the environment and, and instead, making America Great Again, has tarnished its reputation in every corner of the globe. America—the world—does not need a superman in the White House. It needs a man who can quietly return the world’s leading democracy to its core values.

The Russia/Trump story refuses to die. This week a Republican-led bipartisan panel concluded that Trump campaign contacts “represented a grave counter-intelligence threat” as they interacted with Russians including, a Kremlin intelligence officer. The panel concludes that the Russians actively worked to influence the 2016 elections and that Paul Manafort, Roger Stone and perhaps others were keen on Russian help and worked with WikiLeaks to make it happen and undermine Hillary Clinton’s campaign. Russian President Vladimir Putin, said the report, was fully aware of this and backed it to the hilt. White House spokesperson Judd Deere—using looking glass politics—responded to the report with the comment that the report “confirmed that there was absolutely no collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia.”

More problems for Lebanon with this week’s verdict in the trial of Hezbollah activist Salim Ayyad who was found guilty in absentia of the 2005 car bomb murder of former PM Rafik Hariri.  To ensure political impartiality the trial was organised by the UN and conducted at a special tribunal in The Hague. Hezbollah’s leadership has denied any involvement in the assassination and the special tribunal stressed that there was no evidence to link the leadership to Hariri’s death. That has not stopped the country’s Christian right from using the verdict to attack Hezbollah just at a time when the country’s political parties desperately need to pull together.

Politics is a grisly business in Russia as the list of dead Putin opponents grows. Since Putin entered office in 2000 a total of 21 journalists have been killed. Chief among them was Anna Politkovskaya who was shot while investigating human rights abuses in Chechnya. Her lawyer was Stanislaw Markelov was gunned down in a Moscow street. Former KGB agent Alexander Litvinenko died after being served tea laced with deadly polonium-210. Former Russian Minister Mikhail Lesin was bludgeoned to death in a Washington hotel room. Paul Klebnikov, editor of Russian Forbes was murdered while investigating corruption charges and liberal opposition politician Paul Beremtsov was gunned down while crossing a Moscow bridge. One of the most outspoken critics of Vladimir Putin is Alexei Navalny. He has been several times been arrested and imprisoned on trumped-up charges. He has tried to challenge Putin at the polls, but has been either been blocked because of his “criminal record” or simply thrown back behind bars. Navalny is today in a coma in the Siberian city or Ormsk. His family claims that he was served poisoned tea before boarding a flight to Moscow and are trying to have him flown by air ambulance for treatment in Berlin. The Russian authorities say he is suffering from low blood sugar and cannot be moved.

Competence is one of the first requirements of any government. Countries such as China and Singapore have demonstrated that people are—albeit reluctantly—prepared to accept curbs on their freedoms in return for a well-run and relatively prosperous society. Democratic Britain has this week proven itself totally incompetent. It has had to reverse itself on two major policies—exam results for students applying to universities and eviction notices for tenants. In a way, both cases are understandable in the context of the pandemic-induced chaos which has struck governments around the world. But the British case is more worrisome than most as the two recent instances are the eighth and ninth U-turn which the government has been forced to undergo in less than nine months.

Sick, sick, sick is the only way to describe the paedophile case which opened this week in Germany and is being billed as the largest case of its kind in history. The key figure is 43-year-old Jorg L who cannot be named in order to protect his wife and child. But the investigation has also netted another 87 suspected paedophiles who have been identified in 16 German states. Fifty children aged three months to 15 years have been removed from abusive parents. Three of the investigators have been so traumatised that they have taken sick leave. But perhaps the most worrying aspect of the case is that somewhere region of 30,000 people signed up to Jorg L’s secure server to watch him and others violent abusing their own children.

It was a historic moment. A key Arab state—the United Arab Emirates and Israel agreed to establish diplomatic links and Israel suspended plans to annex the West Bank. The announcement was quickly followed by an agreement to start air traffic between the two countries. Cooperation in fields such as energy, water, science and other areas will quickly follow. Just what the long-term impact will remain to be seen. The Palestinians denounced the move as “treason.” Trump hopes it will help his re-election campaign. Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu hopes for the same but at the same time he has angered Israel’s right-wing with his suspension of the West Bank annexation

Elsa, the German wild boar, is for the chop, and possibly someone’s pride of place at the dinner table. Her crime: She and her piglets stole the rucksack containing the clothes and laptop of a nude German bather at Berlin’s Teufelssee Lake and had the misfortune to be filmed in the act. The hilarious video of an overweight nude man chasing Elsa and her piglets went viral. It seems that humans have only themselves to blame for flagrant theft. They have for years been feeding the park boars with juicy apples, with the result that the animals have lost any sense of shyness or shame. A spokesperson for the Forestry Commission said that as a result, Elsa would have to be “withdrawn” (a polite way of saying shot). As a result, dozens of save the pig protesters descended on the lakeside park and a petition has so far garnered over 6,000 signatures. “This wild boar has earned the right to live,” declared the protesters.

Stay Healthy,

Tom  Arms