The National Electoral Board of Ethiopia (NEBE) has announced official results for 307 federal seats of the 524 constituencies where elections were held on 15^th May 2005. The results were released on Friday 8^th July in the presence of representatives of political parties, international observers and the media at the NEBE Headquarters.

Out of the 307 official results, the ruling EPRDF has secured 139 seats followed by the two major oppositions CUD, 93 and UEDF 42 seats respectively. The other results are as follows: OFDM 11, BGPDUF 8, ANDP 6, GPDM 3, SMPDUO 1, SPDP 1, HNL 1, ANDO 1 and Independent 1.

The 307 results declared include those constituencies where the results were not contested by any party and those where the complaints lodged were rejected by the Complaints Review Body (CRB) and the Board after preliminary hearings. The NEBE will announce official results for the remaining 217 constituencies and state councils in the coming weeks.

NEBE Chairman Kemal Bedri said the 26 Complaints Investigation Panels (CIPs) deployed to 140 disputed constituencies in the country are expected to complete their work in the next week.

“The Board will give final decisions based on the recommendations made by the CIPs when their work is completed,” he said. “The decisions will include upholding provisional results or ordering re-runs in some or all of the polling stations of a constituency.”

The CRB is also expected to give its recommendation on the 64 constituencies it has been conducting hearings. “If there are any constituencies to be re-considered for investigation, they will be probed by other teams together with the 14 constituencies decided to be investigated earlier,” Kemal said.

Elections for the 23 constituencies of the Somali regional state will take place on 21st August 2005 and results will be announced after a couple of weeks.

ENDS