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Oops: Azerbaijan released election results before voting had even started
By Max Fisher, Published: October 9 at 5:31 pmr
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev votes in Baku on Wednesday.
(AFP/Getty Images)
Azerbaijan's big presidential election, held on Wednesday, was
anticipated to be neither free nor fair. President Ilham Aliyev, who
took over from his father 10 years ago, has stepped up intimidation of
activists and journalists. Rights groups are complaining about free
speech restrictions and one-sided state media coverage. The BBC's
headline for its story on the election reads "The Pre-Determined
President." So expectations were pretty low.
Even still, one expects a certain ritual in these sorts of
authoritarian elections, a fealty to at least the appearance of
democracy, if not democracy itself. So it was a bit awkward when
Azerbaijan's election authorities released vote results - a full day
before voting had even started.
The vote counts - spoiler alert: Aliyev was shown as winning by a
landslide - were pushed out on an official smartphone app run by the
Central Election Commission. It showed Aliyev as "winning" with 72.76
percent of the vote. That's on track with his official vote counts in
previous elections: he won ("won"?) 76.84 percent of the vote in 2003
and 87 percent in 2008.
The Azerbaijani Central Election Commission sent out these vote totals
to its official smartphone app before voting started. (meydan.tv)
In second place was opposition candidate Jamil Hasanli with 7.4
percent of the vote. Hasanli had recently appealed to the Central
Election Commission for paid airtime on state TV, arguing that Aliyev
gets heavy airtime and the opposition does not. He was denied.
The data were quickly recalled. The official story is that the app's
developer had mistakenly sent out the 2008 election results as part of
a test. But that's a bit flimsy, given that the released totals show
the candidates from this week, not from 2008.
You might call this a sort of Kinsley gaffe on a national scale. (A
Kinsley gaffe, named for journalist Michael Kinsley, is when a
politician gets in trouble for saying something that's widely known as
true but that he isn't supposed to say.) There's supposed to be a
certain ritual to an election like Azerbaijan's: demonstrations are
put down, reporters are harassed, opposition candidates are whittled
down, supporters are ushered to the polls and then Aliyev's sweeping
victory is announced. They got the order wrong here.
As of this writing, Azerbaijan's election authorities say they've
counted 80 percent of the ballots, with Aliyev winning just under 85
percent of the vote so far. He's been officially reelected.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/10/09/oops-azerbaijan-released-election-results-before-voting-had-even-started/
By Max Fisher, Published: October 9 at 5:31 pmr
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev votes in Baku on Wednesday.
(AFP/Getty Images)
Azerbaijan's big presidential election, held on Wednesday, was
anticipated to be neither free nor fair. President Ilham Aliyev, who
took over from his father 10 years ago, has stepped up intimidation of
activists and journalists. Rights groups are complaining about free
speech restrictions and one-sided state media coverage. The BBC's
headline for its story on the election reads "The Pre-Determined
President." So expectations were pretty low.
Even still, one expects a certain ritual in these sorts of
authoritarian elections, a fealty to at least the appearance of
democracy, if not democracy itself. So it was a bit awkward when
Azerbaijan's election authorities released vote results - a full day
before voting had even started.
The vote counts - spoiler alert: Aliyev was shown as winning by a
landslide - were pushed out on an official smartphone app run by the
Central Election Commission. It showed Aliyev as "winning" with 72.76
percent of the vote. That's on track with his official vote counts in
previous elections: he won ("won"?) 76.84 percent of the vote in 2003
and 87 percent in 2008.
The Azerbaijani Central Election Commission sent out these vote totals
to its official smartphone app before voting started. (meydan.tv)
In second place was opposition candidate Jamil Hasanli with 7.4
percent of the vote. Hasanli had recently appealed to the Central
Election Commission for paid airtime on state TV, arguing that Aliyev
gets heavy airtime and the opposition does not. He was denied.
The data were quickly recalled. The official story is that the app's
developer had mistakenly sent out the 2008 election results as part of
a test. But that's a bit flimsy, given that the released totals show
the candidates from this week, not from 2008.
You might call this a sort of Kinsley gaffe on a national scale. (A
Kinsley gaffe, named for journalist Michael Kinsley, is when a
politician gets in trouble for saying something that's widely known as
true but that he isn't supposed to say.) There's supposed to be a
certain ritual to an election like Azerbaijan's: demonstrations are
put down, reporters are harassed, opposition candidates are whittled
down, supporters are ushered to the polls and then Aliyev's sweeping
victory is announced. They got the order wrong here.
As of this writing, Azerbaijan's election authorities say they've
counted 80 percent of the ballots, with Aliyev winning just under 85
percent of the vote so far. He's been officially reelected.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/10/09/oops-azerbaijan-released-election-results-before-voting-had-even-started/