 | |||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||
Secretary-General election | |||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||
| Registered | 2,097 Congressmembers | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Turnout | 89.18% | ||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||
 Diagram showing how Congressmembers voted for the Secretary-General. | |||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||
 |
|---|
The 16th Congress of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Saguia El Hamra and Río de Oro (Arabic: المؤتمر السادس عشر للجبهة الشعبية لتحرير الساقية الحمراء ووادي الذهب, Spanish: XVI Congreso del Frente Popular para la Liberación de Saguia El Hamra y Río de Oro) was held in the Dajla refugee camp in Tindouf, Algeria between 13 and 22 January 2023 to renovate the governing bodies of the Polisario Front and establish the movement's main lines of action and strategy for the next leadership term.
The Congress was also used to elect a new Secretary-General for the Polisario Front, which would automatically become the President of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic. For the first time ever, the candidate for Secretary-General was not agreed upon before the Congress. Bachir Mustafa Sayed, brother of the late first president El Uali Mustafa Sayed, ran for the office against the incumbent Brahim Ghali, making this the first truly competitive race for the office and breaking the tradition of establishing a consensus for the office.[1][2]
The Congress' slogan is "Escalating the fighting to expel the occupation and complete sovereignty" (Arabic: تصعيد القتال لطرد الاحتلال لفرض السيادة, Spanish: Escalar la lucha para expulsar al ocupante e imponer la soberanía). The Congress was also named after M'hamed Jaddad, the late Sahrawi coordinator with the MINURSO.[3]
The Congress is the first one to be held in a wartime situation since 1991, due to the breakout of the Second Western Sahara War in 2020. This situation led to the Congress having little international promotion since the Polisario Front sought instead to unite Sahrawis around a war strategy to intensify the war with this Congress.[2]
The Congress finished with the re-election of Brahim Ghali in the first round, barely avoiding a second round (as the president needs the support of two-thirds of the Congress in the first round to be elected). He obtained 69% of the votes, the lowest score ever obtained by the winning candidate since the introduction of direct vote for the office.[4]
- ^ "El Frente Polisario aprueba intensificar la "lucha armada" contra Marruecos en su congreso trienal" [The Polisario Front approves intensifying the "armed struggle" against Morocco at its triennial congress]. RTVE (in Spanish). 19 January 2023. Retrieved 20 January 2023.
- ^ a b Prieto, Nestor (11 January 2023). "El Frente Polisario celebra su XVI Congreso con la promesa de hacer «escalar la guerra» para conseguir la «independencia total»" [The Polisario Front celebrates its 16th Congress with the promise of "escalating the war" to achieve "total independence"]. Descifrando la Guerra (in Spanish). Retrieved 20 January 2023.
- ^ "The Preparatory Committee announces date and place of holding the 16th Conference of the Polisario Front". Sahrawi Press Service. 27 October 2022. Archived from the original on 20 January 2023. Retrieved 20 January 2023.
- ^ Africa Elects [@AfricaElect] (20 January 2023). "Sahrawi Republic: Brahim Ghali (POLISARIO, left-wing to centre-left) has narrowly avoided a second round by getting 69% of the votes, the lowest result ever recorded for a winning presidential candidate" (Tweet). Retrieved 23 January 2023 – via Twitter.