AMMAN (AFP) — Jordan played down reports of electoral fraud as the pro-Western desert kingdom voted amid tight security for a new parliament on Tuesday, although two people were arrested for vote-buying.
Interior Minister Eid al-Fayez said the authorities arrested two people who "tried to buy votes" in the Balqa governorate and Amman.
"The two cases were referred to the concerned authorities that will take legal action against them," Fayez told the official Petra news agency, adding that voting otherwise was trouble-free.
Earlier, he dismissed newspaper reports and opposition charges of vote-buying as inaccurate, telling reporters that the issue "has been exaggerated by the media, and there is no proof to support such claims".
"Vote-buying is a crime and if isolated incidents took place, the issue should not be generalised. I don't think that Jordanian voters accept to sell their votes," said Fayez.
A local newspaper this week published a picture showing a voter allegedly receiving money from the aide of a candidate. The men's faces were blurred out.
And the Islamist opposition, which is fielding 22 candidates including a woman former MP, insisted that "vote-buying is carried out publicly".
"Some buy votes just outside polling stations, mainly in Amman, and the government did not do anything to stop this," Jamil Abu Baker, spokesman for the Islamic Action Front, told reporters.
The IAF, which had threatened a boycott over claims that the municipal polls in July were rigged, also complained of "security interference" in the voting -- a charge denied by Fayez.
"According to witnesses, the votes were rigged again, but the fraud this time was less than that committed during local elections in July," Abu Baker said.
He accused the government of "being involved in stark violations."
"What happened today proved that the elections were not completely fair," he said.
The Islamists had demanded independent monitors, but Prime Minister Marouf Bakhit turned down the request.
The first results declared from the count suggested that independent and tribal candidates loyal to the royal family were set to sweep the polls.
Outgoing speaker Abdel Hadi Majali and former prime minister Abdel Rauf al-Rawabdeh were among the first candidates to be returned.
Victory was also assured for five Islamist opposition candidates, the returning officer said. Analysts predicted that the IAF would end up with 17 seats in 110-member lower house, the same tally it won in the last elections in 2003.
The first results also handed victory to Falaka al-Jamaani, a dentist, and the first woman to be elected to parliament outside the system of quotas which reserves a a minimum of six seats in parliament for women.
A record 199 women women stood for election, more than three times the 54 who stood in 2003.
Nearly 2.5 million Jordanians were eligible to vote from 885 candidates. Final results are expected on Wednesday.
Turnout in the capital reached 49 percent after a two-hour extension of polling hours, electoral officials said. Elsewhere it averaged more than 54 percent.
The polls were the second to take place under King Abdullah II, a Western-educated monarch and close ally of the United States, who has promised fair elections.
Tuesday was declared a holiday in the country of six million people, as 40,000 policemen patrolled the streets and troops were sent to potentially restive tribal areas.
"The most important thing is elect people who can help improve our living conditions and limit the crazy increases in prices," voter Nema Mohammed, 65, told AFP.
Most candidates have chosen slogans linked to economic challenges facing the tiny kingdom, where the minimum wage is set at 110 dinars a month (around 156 dollars) and the unemployment rate is between 14 and 30 percent. Fuel prices are also set to rise in January.
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