KHARTOUM (AFP) — Sudan's parliament on Monday approved an independent electoral commission in a crucial step towards free elections due next year that was immediately overshadowed by a mass arrest of journalists.
The line-up of the nine-member commission, appointed by the presidency and submitted to parliament for approval, was passed by 298 votes to 12 objections more than three months behind schedule, said an AFP reporter.
The names were drawn up by the three-man Sudanese presidency -- head of state Omar al-Beshir, First Vice President and leader of the semi-autonomous south Salva Kiir, and Vice President Ali Osman Taha -- after lengthy disagreement.
The 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), signed by north and south Sudan after a two-decade civil war, calls for elections no later than 2009 as part of a democratic transition, but many parts of the accord have hit major delays.
Just minutes after the parliamentary vote, police arrested 63 journalists for about three hours after they protested against the censorship which flouts the freedom of expression enshrined in Sudan's interim constitution.
"They took us very harshly in one lorry... They are talking about interrogation. They took mobiles and money," Murtada el-Ghali, the editor in chief of Ajras Al-Hurriya daily, told AFP while in custody.
Police started to release the journalists about three hours later.
"The police accuse all the journalists of having an illegal gathering and told them to come tomorrow to the court," lawyer Wagdy Salih said.
The arrests were condemned by the Sudan People's Liberation Movement, former southern rebels who share power with President Beshir's National Congress Party (NCP).
"This is a clear violation of the CPA... This indicates how the democratic transformation is lagging behind," said deputy secretary general Yaser Arman.
Unless outstanding legislation linked to the interim constitution, which includes press freedom, is passed in parliament, "SPLM MPs will not endorse the budget of 2009, which was submitted today to the parliament," he said.
Neither police nor members of the main ruling NCP were reachable for comment.
Both north and south approve the new electoral commission chairman, Abel Alier, a former vice president of Sudan under Jaafar Nimeiri, who ruled the country from 1969 to 1985, and a lawyer from the dominant southern Dinka tribe.
His deputy, Abdallah Ahmed Abdallah, is a professor of agriculture from Khartoum University who was also a regional governor under Nimeiri.
The commission will be tasked with making all the provisions and setting a date for elections despite growing fears that polls will be delayed.
The US embassy in Khartoum welcomed the appointment of the electoral commission and urged it to cooperate closely with the international community in preparation for the elections.
Parliament approved the electoral law on July 7, two and a half years late, and one week before the International Criminal Court prosecutor sought Beshir's arrest on 10 counts of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.
Beshir has vowed that elections will be held on time, but many analysts argue that a formal arrest warrant could see him do everything possible to hold on to power, jeopardising the CPA which ended the longest civil war in Africa.
Sudan's new electoral law grants women 25 percent of the seats in parliament and introduces proportional representation by enshrining quotas for political parties in what has been billed a road towards democratic transformation.
Beshir seized power in a 1989 Islamist-backed coup that overthrew the democratically elected government. He won a new five-year term as president in Sudan's last national election in December 2000.
That election was boycotted by the opposition, and Beshir was first declared president after a 1996 poll widely denounced as fraudulent.
Complete democratic transformation in Sudan is also dependent on a major overhaul of legislation governing the media and national security.
"We need to have the elections, but they should be in a better environment, they should be fair and free," said Arman.
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