Aruba General Elections
Topic: PoliticsToday finally the wait is over. For many local politicians the people will decide what their faith is going to be. General Elections are being held today and at stake are 21 seats of parliament. The last time general elections where held was on September 23rd, 2005.
In Aruba we don’t elect the executive cabinet, but rather our representatives. After the results of the parliamentary elections are known, Aruba’s governor – appointed by Dutch Queen for a term of six years – will receive the leader of each party in parliament before making the next step.
This is a highly symbolic move as the next task by the governor is to appoint an individual, who most of the time is a political heavyweight from within party which obtained the most votes, who in turn will do his round of information. This round of information consits means he must visit all the parties to find out if there is a basis for cooperation and to form a government. After the informant has done his job, he will report to the governor with his findings.
Above step was skipped mostly the last two elections (2001 and 2005) as the political party MEP obtained an unprecedented majority of the 21 seats available.
If the information round has brought forth a base for cooperation between the parties, the governor appoints the individual with the assignment to form a government. This person will always be the leader of the party with the majority of the votes and thus will become the next Prime Minister. Commonly he would have won the popular vote as well.
In case the aforementioned information round didn’t bring any basis for cooperation between the parties the governer appoints another person to go ahead and make is round of inquiries. Typically this person comes from the party with the second biggest support in the elections. In very rare occacions when no cooperation is possible between the parties, thus no majority can be found in parliament, the governor has no choice but to call out new elections.
Aruba elections are typically acompanied by very colorful parades, marches and show of support by voters. The constitunial right to vote is taken serously in all levels of society, thus the turn-out is massive. The participation of the popularion can reach up to a whopping 90%.
Arubans are passionate about politics. Political discussions sometimes heat up conderably. So much so, that there are some bars with the sign “No shirt, no service” and “No political talk”. The discussion sometimes border down to personal attacks rather than debating the issues.
Opinion polls are non-existent. Online polls are unreliable and most media outlets are affiliated a political party, thus making making any analysis or polls not trustworthy.
Conslusion
The weak part in Aruba’s democracy is that we only elect our representatives, be we don’t elect our leaders. The epitome of Democracy in my opinion is to be able to elect the most powerful position: Prime Minister.
September 25th, 2009 Read more » elections