MCA Monitor Blog
« MCC Puts Sri Lanka Compact On Hold | Main | Cross Cutting Lessons from Seven Millennium Challenge Account Countries »
May 16, 2007
Armenia's Elections Are Given a Pass
Posted by Sarah Rose at 05:31 PM
In the run-up to Armenia's May 12 parliamentary elections, there was some concern that the elections would be less than transparent. Some MCC watchers, including the office of Congressman Frank Wolf (R-VA), questioned whether the MCC should be prepared to restrict funds to Armenia should the elections prove substandard. The MCC's response to these concerns was that they were monitoring the situation and working with Armenia to support the election process. Though they never specifically threatened putting the compact on hold if the elections were found to be fraudulent, the MCC was probably pleased to hear that international monitors deemed Armenia's elections relatively free and fair and an improvement over previous ones since the verdict both marks progress for Armenia and relieves the MCC of having to seriously assess its continued partnership with the country based on its commitment to ruling justly (particularly in the wake of its decision to put a hold on Sri Lanka).
Trackback Pings
TrackBack URL for this entry:
/mt/mt-tb.cgi/867
Comments
Sarah -- I suspect the MCC waved the rather large carrot of their program as incentive for the Armenians to stay the course. But I agree with you that I'm sure they were relieved that the elections were deemed relatively fair and free so they didn't have to take on the difficult challenges of suspending an ongoing program in the absence of concrete performance indicator slippage. One of these days we will likely face a situation where the indicators do not immediately capture poor performance or decisionmaking by a country and the policy guidance on the "triggering actions" for suspending ongoing programs isn't explicit enough. In other words, how to effectively enforce/manage the non-politicization of aid component that makes the MCA different? The boldness and transparency with which the MCC deals with that situation will be a defining moment for the institution.
Posted by: Sheila Herrling at May 21, 2007 12:03 PM