Gambian presidential election, 2011

The Gambia
This article is part of a series on the politics and government of the Gambia
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Presidential elections were held in the Gambia on 24 November 2011.^[1] The incumbent Yahya Jammeh (in office since seizing power in a coup d'état in 1994) faced Ousainou Darboe of the United Democratic Party and Hamat Bah of the National Alliance for Democracy and Development.^[2]

Voting took place using marbles dropped into coloured containers each containing a gong.^[3]

Monitoring and criticism

The election was monitored by the African Union who praised the process,^[4] European Union, Organisation of Islamic Cooperation and Commonwealth.^[3] The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) did not send any monitors because of "an unacceptable level of control of the electronic media by the party in power... and an opposition and electorate cowed by repression and intimidation".^[3]

Before the election Jammeh had claimed "I will never compromise peace and stability at the altar of so-called democracy",^[5] that "there is no way I can lose unless you tell me that all Gambian people are mad" and in response to press criticism said "The journalists are less than 1% of the population and if anybody expects me to allow less than 1% of the population to destroy 99% of the population, you are in the wrong place."^[6]

On the election day Bah claimed that he had not heard of any intimidation of his supporters^[7] although Darboe claimed the vote was fraudulent, rejected the result^[6][8][9] and complained of intimidation from the presence of military vehicles on the streets.^[10]

The Independent Electoral Commission also said there was no intimidation^[11] and that "it is impossible to rig elections in Gambia".^[7]

There was also criticism of the election organisation as many voters went to the wrong polling station.^[3]

Results

The election was won by a huge majority by Yahya Jammeh^[12] on an 83% turnout.^[13]

(Data from IEC)^[13]

References

Elections and referendums in the Gambia
Presidential elections	1982 1987 1992 1996 2001 2006 2011 2016
Parliamentary elections	1947 1951 1954 1960 1962 1966 1972 1977 1982 1987 1992 1997 2002 2007 2012 2017
Referendums	1965 1970 1996