2016 Jordanian general election

The Parliament of Jordan consists of two chambers, an upper Senate appointed by the King, and a lower Chamber of Deputies elected through popular vote. These share equal legislative responsibility. The King appoints the Prime Minister and Cabinet from the lower house, and also hold wide legislative and executive powers. After parliament is dissolved, the constitution mandates elections be held within four months, although the King may delay elections or suspend parliament and rule by decree. The government can be dismissed by a two-thirds vote of no confidence by the Chamber of Deputies. and the right to vote is voided for some convicts. Parliament has quotas for women, as well as for some ethnic and religious minorities. Women have 15 reserved seats, Christians have nine seats, and Circassians and Chechens share three. Bedouin tribes have their own electoral districts, and elect nine members of parliament, three of which overlap with the women's quota. While political parties do exist, they have historically been repressed, and for many decades the political system has been designed to weaken them. Electoral reforms Political parties were long suppressed in Jordan under martial law. An economic crash and resultant unrest led to political liberalisation in 1989. Due to the 1989 election results, King Hussein changed the political system for the 1993 elections in order to suppress Islamist votes. This system was unpopular with many political parties, and subsequent elections held under this system faced boycotts by numerous groups, notably the Islamic Action Front. Reform bodies were set up, and some substantial changes were made including the introduction of an Independent Election Committee (IEC), and the introduction of a mixed electoral system whereby 27 of the 150 elected seats would be determined through nationwide proportional representation. Most changes however were cosmetic at best, and political parties including the IAF boycotted the 2013 election. The proposed reforms were revealed on 31 August 2015. The new electoral system was very similar to the 1989 elections, in that it fully did away with one-man one-vote, reintroducing block voting for all seats. One major difference was that in addition to voting for individual candidates, voters will also have a single vote for a multi-member party list, an adaptation taken from the experiment with proportional representation in the 2013 elections. All candidates will run as members of lists, with open list PR used to determine all seats falling outside of quotas. For the Circassian/Chechen and Christian seats, the seat is given to the highest candidate from within those groups. The female quota seats however are assigned to women who would not otherwise be elected. Parliament was dissolved on 29 May and the government of Abdullah Ensour resigned, with the King appointing Hani Al-Mulki as caretaker Prime Minister in the lead-up to the election. Electoral districts or part of a governorate. There are 23 electoral districts; five in the Amman governorate, four in the Irbid governorate, two in the Zarqa governorate, one each for the other nine governorates, and three badia districts for Bedouins. The Circassian/Chechen and Christian quotas were included among seats assigned within the governorate districts. Of the nine seats for the Christian quota, two are in both the Balqa district and the Karak district, and there is one in each of the following: Irbid's 3rd district, the Ajloun district, Zarqa's 1st district, Amman's 3rd district, and the Madaba district. The three Circassian/Chechen seats are in Zarqa's 1st district, Amman's 3rd district, and Amman's 4th district. The female quota is divided so that there is one seat in each governorate, and one in each badia. While the division of population between districts remains imperfect, it was an improvement upon previous elections. Administration Like with the 2013 election, the 2016 election will be run by the IEC. The IEC has stated one of its aims for the 2016 election is the restoration of public faith in the electoral system. Candidates were required to register by 16 August. Campaign spending is capped by the IEC to 5 dinars per voter in a district for large urban districts. This is the first election where special centres are to be provided for deaf and blind voters. Voter registration was automatic, carried out using lists provided to the IEC by the Civil Service and the Passport Division. Indelible ink will be compulsory for voters. ==Campaign==

The reforms led to fears that Palestinians and Islamists would increase their influence. The Muslim Brotherhood Association, which emphasises its Jordanian identity, was given official status in March 2015. Subsequent internal dissent among the original Muslim Brotherhood led to the resignation of hundreds of members. Two other splinter groups have also broken away from the Muslim Brotherhood. The Muslim Brotherhood Association leveraged its official status to launch lawsuits claiming ownership of Muslim Brotherhood property, The government also prevented a celebration of the 70th anniversary of the founding of the Muslim Brotherhood. Two Muslim Brotherhood-linked candidates, Hossam Messheh and Ali Abussokar, were disqualified from the elections for the offence of showing mourning for the death of the international terrorist, Abu Musab Al-Zarkawi. Ali Abusokkar was a member of the parliament in 2006 when he was expelled for visiting the mourning house of Al-Khalayleh tribe, the tribe that Al-Zarkawi hails from. On 10 September, the deadline for withdrawal from the parliamentary race, the final number of candidates reached 1,252 in 226 lists. 18 candidates had withdrawn from the race, while 21 applications were rejected. The Jordan News Agency reported that "1,252 candidates comprised 920 Muslim males, 245 Muslim females, 58 Christian males, five Christian females, 22 Circassian and Chechen males and two Circassian and Chechen females." ==Conduct==

The Independent Electoral Commission sent invites to a number of Arab and foreign organizations to observe the election process. The European Union will take part in the observation of the election process through a task force that has access to all poll related facilities, including police stations. IEC declared that this is a step to ensure fair and transparent elections. International observers stated that the elections were organized "with integrity and in full transparency". Few violations were reported, and the committees presented recommendations for upcoming elections. ==Results==

Around 1.5 million Jordanians went to the polls on 20 September, a 37% voter turnout. Number of eligible voters numbered around 4.1 million, up from 2.3 million in 2013. Voter turnout is lower than the previous elections due to the new elections law, where Jordanian expatriates, numbered at 1 million, were not granted the ability to vote. Five women managed to win outside the quota system, making the total of female parliamentarians 20 out of 130, a record for Jordan. The last elections held 18 women out of 150. The elections witnessed the first emergence of a secular movement, the Ma'an list, which strongly advocated for a civil state. It received the most votes in Amman's third district. Two candidates from Ma'an were elected, alongside three Islamists, as they had won in the women and Circassian quotas of Amman's third district. By district ==Aftermath==

The reforms introduced in the 2016 general elections, led Freedom House to designate Jordan as "partly free" from the previous "not free" in its Freedom in the World 2017 report. The report added that the change was "due to electoral law changes that led to somewhat fairer parliamentary elections." ==References==