Site Created: October 2004
Launch Date: 10 November 2004
The purpose of the African Elections Database
is to provide a comprehensive archive of past and present election results for the 48 countries of Sub-Saharan Africa.
Each country's election page starts with a political profile.
The political profile gives an overview of the political leadership and a brief history of the political situation in the
country since its independence (for a description of terms used in this section, visit the Terms and Definitions page). A list of political parties (sorted alphabetically by acronym) and coalitions
are found at the end of the political profile.
Election Results at this site may differ from those posted
on other sites for some of the following reasons:
-Many sites post the provisional final results that are released
soon after an election. On this site, provisional results are posted until the definitive results (usually one to two weeks
after the election) are released.
Example: In Ghana's most recent presidential election,
held on 7 December 2004, the provisional final results gave incumbent President John Kufuor 52.75% of the vote. The definitive
results, which were released on 2 January 2005, gave him 52.45%. This site uses the 52.45% figure, while most others used
the provisional result.
-When some sites (especially government sites) post election
results, they include invalid/blank votes in the final total. On this site, percentages are based on distribution among valid
votes, unless otherwise noted.
Example: The final results
of Burundi’s Constitutional Referendum, conducted on 28 February 2005, showed a 90.10% "Yes" vote and a 7.82% "No" vote.
The invalid votes constituted the remaining 2.08%. On this site, the new results that exclude invalid votes gives the "Yes"
vote 92.02% and the "No" vote 7.98%.
Since April 2005, data on registered voters has been added to
election pages. Due to the difficulty in obtaining these figures for some countries, it will take a while to complete this
task for all 48 countries. On pages where these figures have not been added, only voter turnout and valid vote figures (listed
as Total Votes) are given. On pages where registered voter information has been added, Total Votes include all votes cast
(valid valid+invalid/blank votes).
Example 1: Registered Voter Information Included
29-30 September 1992 National Assembly Election (Angola)
Registered Voters 4,828,468
Total Votes 4,410,575
[Voter Turnout: 91.3%]
Invalid/Blank Votes 458,310
Total Valid Votes 3,952,265
Example 2: Registered Voter Information not yet added
29-30 September 1992 National Assembly Election
(Angola)
Voter Turnout: 91.3%
Total Votes: 3,952,265
All data found on this web site was obtained from Internet sources. Types
of sites where most results are found are:
-Local Online Newspapers from the country of research
-Official
Government documents from the country of research
-Electoral Observer mission reports
-Web Archive (http://web.archive.org/), which can retrieve pages from old/dead web sites
-Numerous web searches
(mainly in English, French, and Portuguese)
-Research papers written by individuals on elections and electoral
systems
in Sub-Saharan Africa (usually PDF documents)
-Other Election Sites, etc.
