In the coffee shops and kava bars of Vanuatu’s capital of Port Vila, there are two subjects that dominate conversation: COVID-19 and the general elections, which are to be held today.
Vanuatu, a south Pacific nation just a three-hour flight from Australia, has a population of just fewer than 300,000. It is often thought of as a politically unstable nation, with shifting political allegiances, seemingly based more on expediency than ideology.
Fourteen lawmakers, including the acting prime minister, were in 2015 found guilty of corruption, putting half the governing party’s lawmakers behind bars.
The last elections were held in January 2016 and Vanuatuan Prime Minister Charlot Salwai has been in power since then.
This year’s elections come at a key time for Vanuatu, which this year marks its 40th anniversary of independence from joint rule by France and the UK. It is also scheduled to host the next meeting of the Pacific Islands Forum leaders — the most significant regional diplomatic event — in August, and is scheduled to graduate from “least-developed” status by the end of the year.
From a field of almost 240 candidates, the people of Vanuatu are to elect 52 lawmakers to sit in parliament. The prime minister is to be elected by the entire house when it sits later this year.
Vanuatuan politics is fractured and complex. After the 2016 elections there were 17 parties represented in the parliament, but none of them secured more than six seats and coalition governments have been a feature of the Vanuatu political scene for quite some time. That is unlikely to change this year.
While long-established parties such as the Vanua’aku Pati and the United Moderates Party are likely to have a presence in the new parliament, newer groupings such as Salwai’s Reunification Movement for Change and the Leaders Party of Vanuatu, led by outgoing Vanuatuan Deputy Prime Minister Jotham Napat, are expected to feature strongly.
The profile of political candidates in Vanuatu has evolved over the years. Back in 1980, when Father Walter Lini became the first prime minister, the political leadership was largely made up of pastors and senior members of churches.
Now, Vanuatu’s parliament is increasingly a gathering of technocrats. At this election, a large number of former public servants have thrown their hats into the ring, as well as a number of candidates from the private sector.
At the last election, voter turnout was 57 percent, and there are concerns that people’s fears of COVID-19, of which there have been no confirmed cases in Vanuatu so far, would present an additional hurdle to overcome.
The director-general of the ministry of internal affairs has urged people to vote and said there will be hand sanitiser at polling stations in an effort to provide some reassurance to people who might otherwise stay away.
Once the elections are done, it will likely be a few weeks before there is certainty about what the leadership of Vanuatu will look like.
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