How the Elections Went in Mareb [Archives:1999/39/Local News]

Hassan Saeed Al-Zaidei,
Yemen Times
On the morning of Thursday Sept. 23, the process of voting was began in all the electoral districts in Mareb, except the electoral center No.( i ) in the constituency No. (300), division of Mahjaz, where all the committees and the military units were prevented by Sharhan and his men of entering the center. They alleged that they have such demands from the government that they have not received yet.
Many letters were sent to tell and threaten the Governor that the electoral committees should not go to their areas because they have legal demands from the government. A tribal source has mentioned that those persons who interrupted the elections has got weapons to do as such.
From the other side, the military units became exposed to the shelling of the RBG weapons in the pumps petroleum stations No. (2), which are located 50 Km. far from Mareb by unknown tribal groups. Fortunately, there was no any physical or financial costs.
The head of the committee, Mr. Saleh Al-Tamm gave the voting polls to the committee in the electoral district No. 301 after he was arresting them by alleging that he has not received his privileges. We have met with some members of the committee who indicated that they paid eighty Rials to any one who can bring a citizen to vote.
Mr. Mohammed Al-Adani was finally persuaded to give voting polls as he got his privileges.
The head of the main committee in the constituency No. (300) has illustrated that there are some problems which interrupt the work of the committees because there are many polls in Madghal, Majzar and Rakhwan towns, which have not yet being received. There was also a big noise inside the voting committees caused by the citizens themselves. In addition to this, there was no official commissioners for the independent candidate, Mr. Najeeb Khatan Al-Shabei in the electoral districts.

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