Pro-government loyalists sweep Jordan election

Jordanians voted in large numbers to elect a parliament dominated by pro-government loyalists, with 13 women winning seats, after a boycott by opposition Islamists, official results showed on Wednesday.

In the new 120-member lower house, 78 MPs are newcomers, Interior Minister Nayef Qadi said, adding that 17 lawmakers are members of political parties.

"Voters have showed their desire for change by electing new faces, which is a positive thing," Taher Masri, president of Jordan's appointed Senate, or upper house, told AFP.

"People chose those who are professional in public work, and they did not vote for those who have focused on their personal interests and not parliamentary work."

The house, with a strong showing by tribal-linked candidates, will have 13 women MPs. Reem Badran, an economist and daughter of a former premier, won a seat in Amman outside a quota system which reserves 12 seats for women.

"This parliament will be manageable by the government," said Mohammed Momani, a political science professor at Yarmuk University. "The lower house is likely to react to the government and its initiatives and follow its lead."

The government on Tuesday announced a 53-percent turnout, similar to the figure recorded in the elections of 1989, when Jordan launched the democratic process.

Prime Minister Samir Rifai said the turnout showed that "the boycott did not have an impact on voting," but the Islamist camp doubted the high turnout figure and also made charges of vote-buying and fraud.

"In my opinion the actual turnout did not exceed 30 percent," said Hamzah Mansur, leader of the Islamic Action Front (IAF), Jordan's main opposition party.

"The new lower house will not be better this time as vote-buying and fraud played a major role in the election."

Violence marred the election day, with a 25-year-old man shot dead and two others wounded in clashes between rival supporters in the southern city of Karak, police said.

Clashes also broke out in different parts of the kingdom, including Amman as well as the northern cities of Irbid and Jerash.

The government agreed, for the first time, to allow 250 international observers to monitor the election alongside some 3,000 local representatives of non-government organisations.

The US National Democratic Institute (NDI) was to hold a news conference at 1400 GMT to announce its findings.

Jordan has been without a parliament since November 2009 when King Abdullah II dissolved a 2007 legislature and called an election two years early after press allegations about ineffectiveness and corruption among MPs.

Amman and Zarqa, which is an Islamist stronghold, registered the lowest voter turnout.

Only one of seven Islamist candidates, who registered as independents, defying the IAF's boycott, won a seat in the lower house of parliament in Tuesday's poll.

The Islamists boycotted the vote in protest at constituency boundaries set under a new electoral law adopted in May.

They say these over-represent rural areas considered loyal to the government at the expense of urban areas regarded as Islamist strongholds. The IAF says the law has returned Jordan to a previous controversial voting system.

Some 2.5 million Jordanians were eligible to vote, with 763 candidates vying for a four-year term in lower house of parliament. Jordan's parliament has an elected 120-member lower house and a 60-member senate, appointed by the king.

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