For the last month, 15 different political parties were having parties all day and night trying to sway São Tomeans to vote for them. Luckily for us, most of these parties were held across from our apartment in the soccer stadium in the local park. These parties did not consist of speeches and promises for a better tomorrow, no, they were straight up parties - loud music, local musicians, food and drinks. Some of these political rallies went late into the night and some were held during the day specifically for children. During the days, trucks and cars drove around town with flags waving, people yelling out the windows, and some with speaker systems in the bed of the trucks blasting loud music. The different parties had colors, so if the cars and trucks were driving by super fast (which was usually the case) then you could still see what party it was for. There were about 4 major parties with the most money to spend for votes that we saw most frequently in the city. Oddly, around the same time as the elections were drawing near, new clothes and accessories started to appear on people, new cars and trucks appeared on the roads, and tons of new scooters and motorcycles appeared. Our friend who is the Cape Verde Ambassador told us that during election season (which happens every 5 years) money suddenly appears. Money that is not around any other time for roads, education, or health care. Another friend of ours told us that the owner of the Toyota shop in town was bragging that during election season, he sells 5000 motorcycles and scooters! Enough to get him through till the next election time. A guy we know worked for one of the parties, and his job was to go into communities with a truck full of clothes, beer, and soccer balls and to just give it all away in the name of the party. The local park, like I said earlier, held quite a few of the rallies, and because of this, light bulbs that had been out for months were replaced for the late night parties! Its so nice to walk through the park and see where we are going now. I know that in our country votes are bought and bribed for. I am not so dumb as to not think it happens. But to see it so openly and blatant, especially in the face of such need and negligence – it was really hard to witness. There is not a local paper that regularly is printed here, and the news on the TV and radio did not talk about specific parties, so Jared and I have no idea the platform of these various parties, and I think – given the multiple rallies we witnessed – that a lot of São Tomeans did not either. Several people we talked to (Pastors, artists, and the guard on our street) all said that they do not vote because the whole government is corrupt and it doesn’t matter, that the parties are not about issues, just money. How sad. To be a democracy, to be able to vote and to feel that your vote does not matter – its just like the USA in that respect, I guess.
Anyway, another very popular bribe is power. The electric company is owned by the government, and as the elections drew closer, our power got better and better. In fact, the elections were supposed to be in March, but were pushed back twice and finally were in late July. As we discussed power issues with people the whole time here, a common lament was “Oh, the power is good now because of the elections. Just wait until they are over. You haven’t seen anything yet!” On any given day, Jared and I have about 14-20 hours of power. The outages are usually 1-3 hours long and happen all throughout the day. There is no schedule for the power here, unlike other countries and even the island of Principe. The longest we went with out power was 14 hours – we had two of those back to back with 2 hours of power in between. But, as the elections drew near, we were having 20 -22 hours of power everyday! It was great! But, we were also worried about the days following the elections. Luckily, it hasn’t been too bad. The last two weeks we have been having about 16 hours of power or so a day and usually the longest outages are late at night when we are sleeping.
A new party ended up being elected, but not by a huge majority, which means the old party and the new one will have to work together. This, we think, will be good for São Tomé. Learning to compromise and work together is good for anyone!
Thank God we are in a country that is stable, safe, and non-violent. The last attempted coup was 5 years ago, after the last elections. A group of rebels stole the nation’s only tank and planned to storm the Presidential Palace. However, the tank needed gas and the São Tomeans in line at the central gas station in town refused to let the tank cut. So, while the tank was waiting in line at the gas station, the military retook the tank and the “coup” was over.
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