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C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 NOUAKCHOTT 000784 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 06/26/2016 
TAGS: PREL PGOV PHUM PINR EAID KPAO MR
SUBJECT: THE REFERENDUM -- 97% VOTE "YES" TO 
CONSTITUTIONALLY LIMIT THE POWER OF THE PRESIDENCY; CAN 
SUCH A LOP-SIDED VOTE NOT/NOT BE RIGGED? 
 
Classified By: Amb. Joseph LeBaron, Reasons 1.4(b)(d) 
 
-------------- 
(C) Key Points 
-------------- 
 
-- According to official figures, Mauritania's voters in the 
national referendum on June 25th were virtually unanimous in 
their support for several constitutional amendments limiting 
the powers of the presidency. 
 
-- Here are the numbers: 
 
757,340     Total number of ballots cast (76% of all voters) 
 21,783     Ballots deemed invalid (2.9% of all ballots) 
 
Of the remaining 735,557 ballots: 
 
Yes:        713,263 (96.97%) 
No:       10,427 (1.4%) 
Neutral:  11,822 (1.6%) (neutral was an option) 
 
 
-- The 97% "yes" vote reported by the Mauritanian authorities 
is consistent with what our Embassy monitors witnessed in 
over 60 polling stations they visited around the country to 
observe the vote.  The polling stations included some 
randomly chosen at the last minute. 
 
-- Other election observation teams, including those 
representing the African Union and the Arab League, and at 
least one UN election expert, have told us they believe the 
vote was free and fair and that the referendum met 
international standards. 
 
-- Some irregularities in electoral mechanics and some 
procedural lapses did occur.  These are reported below.  But 
these problems did not appear to have a significant impact on 
the referendum results, and they did not appear designed or 
coordinated to defraud the election results. 
 
-- The Embassy has meetings scheduled, starting tomorrow, 
June 27th, with UNDP, the UN Electoral Team, and other 
international partners to discuss further the results of the 
referendum.  We will report further after those meetings. 
 
------------------------- 
(C) Comments and Analysis 
------------------------- 
 
¶1. (C) The extraordinarily high percentage of yes votes 
notwithstanding, the evidence available to us suggests the 
referendum met international standards for a free and fair 
election.  There could, of course, have been fraud that we 
have not yet uncovered, and we explore that possibility below 
in paras. 3-8. 
 
¶2. (C) Some possible explanations for the validity of a 97% 
yes vote include the following: 
 
      -- The strong influence of a campaign mounted by an 
extremely popular government to get out the vote in support 
of the constitutional amendments.  The government did not 
take a neutral stance.  It urged all Mauritanians to "Vote 
Yes."  The vote could well have been more a referendum on the 
government than on constitutional change. 
 
      -- Those against the government and against 
constitutional change did not vote, either because the 
outcome of the referendum was already a forgone conclusion or 
because they were unable to vote. 
 
      -- The recent census and voter registration drive 
almost certainly disenfranchised at least some Black African 
Mauritanians in the south.  This group, which may have been 
less supportive of the referendum, was not registered at an 
equal rate to other, potentially more supportive groups. 
 
      -- Note: These and other Mauritanians will have at 
least one more chance to register.  After many complaints 
 
NOUAKCHOTT 00000784  002 OF 002 
 
 
about failing to register all eligible Mauritanians, 
including repeated complaints by this Embassy, the government 
has decided to reopen the voter rolls at least one more time 
before the presidential election next March. End Note. 
 
¶3. (C) A second explanation we have considered is outright 
fraud.  However, all those actually in the field observing 
these elections (both from our observation teams and those 
from the AU, Arab League, OIF, and UN) have reported an 
election free from fraud. 
 
¶4. (C)  In all, these teams visited over 125 polling stations 
around the country, and observed over 30 different ballot 
tabulations (from the seals on the ballot boxes being cut, to 
the boxes being opened, to the final tally of ballots). 
Tallies from these observations all reported ballot counts 
within the 95% - 98% support range.  That's in line with the 
official results. 
 
¶5. (C) That is not to say that fraud could not have occurred, 
but if it did, it would have had to have occurred before the 
ballot tabulations (such as with ballot stuffing during the 
day when observers were at another location).  While this is 
possible, the list of registered voters in each polling 
location would have had to have been altered as well (by 
checking off names of voters that hadn't voted and then 
submitting the same number of yes ballots).  However, this 
would have shown up when some of these voters later came to 
vote and were told that they had already voted and been 
checked off the list.  Observers would most certainly have 
seen cases of this, but no such cases were reported. 
 
¶6. (C) UN Electoral Team Communication expert Riccardo 
Barranca, who had conducted similar observation missions in 
over 15 other countries told PolOff that "we would have seen 
widespread fraud if it had occurred," adding that "the level 
of fraud that would have been needed to fake results such as 
these would have been impossible to hide." 
 
¶7. (C) Barranca said "fraud may have gone unnoticed, but the 
safeguards we had in place here would have kept the impact of 
such fraud to only a couple of percentage points at most." 
Barranca added that he was "surprised by how well organized 
and transparent these elections appeared."  When asked if he 
thought the election was "free and fair," he said 
"personally, I do, but that's as much a political question as 
it is one related to the elections themselves." 
 
¶8. (C) Since so many eyes in the field failed to see a single 
sign of a deliberate effort to defraud the election, we 
conclude that the lack of any real referendum opposition, 
combined with the strong government-led campaign in support 
of the referendum, are what led to these extraordinary 
results. 
 
¶9. (C) Additionally, we will report septel on the public 
reaction of Mauritanian political parties and civil society 
to these extraordinary election results.  Some have claimed 
that fraud must have played a role (though they provide no 
examples or theories for such fraud).  Others, such as 
SOS-Esclaves (SOS-Slaves), believes the elections were free 
and fair, and that the strong results demonstrate the strong 
support of the Mauritanian public for this transition. 
SOS-Esclaves' stance follows the government's refusal to 
allow their organization to observe elections.  The group 
decided to ignore this refusal and went forward with its own 
observation mission anyway. 
LeBaron