From Responsibility to Response: Assessing National - Brookings

CHAPTER 1 Assessing National Approaches to Internal Displacement: Findings from 15 Countries
the Electoral Code and the law on IDPs meant that IDPs
could not register their residence in the location of their
displacement—and thereby be entitled to vote in that
electoral district—without losing their IDP status and
the entitlements it entails under national law. In other
words, IDPs were doubly disenfranchised: they were
unable to vote for deputies from their area of origin
and for those representing the locality where they resided
during their displacement. NGOs brought the
issue before the Constitutional Court. Francis Deng, the
Representative of the Secretary-General on the Human
Rights of Internally Displaced Persons (RSG on IDPs),
OHCHR, and the OSCE also undertook advocacy on
the issue, which NGOs raised in the UN Human Rights
Committee and UN Commission on Human Rights
(now UN Human Rights Council). In 2001 and 2003,
the Election Code was amended to remove the restrictions
preventing IDPs from exercising their right to vote
in their current place of residence. Moreover, in 2003, a
decision of Parliament ended the mandate of the Abkhaz
parliamentary deputies, last elected in 1992, with their
seats to be left vacant until such time that parliamentary
elections can be held again in Abkhazia. 30 However,
there still are practical difficulties—for example, in registering
IDPs on electoral lists—and there is a certain
disenchantment among IDPs with the political process
and their resulting disengagement from it.
In Iraq, legal and practical obstacles have impeded IDPs’
exercise of their voting rights, though a number of the
issues have now been addressed. The nonregistration of
IDPs and returnees “remains a significant humanitarian
concern,” according to RSG Walter Kälin’s report following
his visit to Iraq in 2010, as it inhibits or precludes
access to basic services and government assistance, impedes
the transfer or recognition of certain documents
and the rental or purchase of land, and impedes exercise
of the right to vote. During his visit, however, Kälin was
informed of the government’s willingness and intention
30 Erin Mooney and Balkees Jarrah, The Voting Rights of
Internally Displaced Persons: The OSCE Region (Brookings-
SAIS Project on Internal Displacement, November 2004),
pp. 33–41.
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to reopen registration procedures for all IDPs. 31 Many
of the more than 200,000 people who had recently been
displaced from Fallujah were unable to register before
the deadline to vote in the 2005 elections; other IDPs
were unable to register due to a lack of documentation;
and there were no provisions for absentee voting. 32
Security concerns also made it difficult for IDPs to travel
to polling stations. To address that issue, in the January
2005 election in Iraq, polling stations were set up in
the camps, at least for IDPs who had been displaced
from Fallujah. 33 By the March 2010 parliamentary elections,
an amendment to Law No. 16 (2005) on elections
meant that IDPs were able to register at the location of
displacement to vote in elections in their electoral districts
in their place of origin—that is, through absentee
voting. 34 A displaced voter was defined as an Iraqi who
was forcibly displaced from his/her permanent place
of residence to another place inside Iraq after 9 April
2003, for whatever reason. While only 97,000 IDPs—
around 5 percent of the total figure for IDPs displaced
since 2003—registered to vote as absentees during the
voter registration updates that occurred in 2008 and
2009, all Iraqis registered in the public distribution
system for food rations were automatically registered to
vote. According to the UN Assistance Mission in Iraq
(UNAMI), there were 1,100 polling stations for IDPs
registered for absentee voting; in addition, 541 polling
stations were set up for conditional absentee voting for
voters registered as IDPs with the Ministry of Trade
or the Ministry of Displacement and Migration who
did not register with the Independent High Electoral
Commission for absentee voting. 35 Total voting turnout
31 UN Human Rights Council, Report of the Representative
of the Secretary-General on the Human Rights of Internally
Displaced Persons, Walter Kälin—Addendum: Visit to Iraq,
A/HRC/16/43/Add.1, para. 52, 16 February 2011 (http://
ap.ohchr.org/documents/dpage_e.aspx?m=71).
32 Erin Mooney and Balkees Jarrah, “Iraq’s Displaced Voters,”
New York Times, Letter to the Editor, 25 January 2005.
33 Mooney and Jarrah, “Safeguarding IDP Voting Rights,” p.
55.
34 Amendment passed by the Council of Representatives in
November 2009 and approved by the Presidency Council
of Iraq in December 2009.
35 UNAMI Electoral Assistance Office, Fact Sheet: Voting for