PCHR welcomes the decision taken by the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) to hold a presidential election to choose a new president for the PNA to succeed the late President Yasser Arafat on January 2005. PCHR also calls for intensive efforts to be made in order to hold parliamentary elections at an appropriate time in the same year.

This decision has come in a series of steps recently taken by the Palestinian political leadership to ensure the peaceful transition of authority following the death of President Yasser Arafat on 11 November 2004. These steps included choosing Mr. Mahmoud Aabbas (Abu Mazen) to be the Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) to succeed President Arafat who held the responsibilities of this post for decades, according to the laws that govern the PLO and its institutions. Mr. Rawhi Fattouh, Speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC), swore the constitutional oath to be the temporary president of the PNA for a period that would not exceed 60 days, during which free and direct elections would be organized to choose a new president in accordance with Article 37 of the Palestinian Basic Law. On 14 November 2004, Mr. Fattouh issued a presidential decree specifying 9 January 2005 as a date for holding presidential election.

Holding general elections, both presidential and parliamentary, has been demanded by PCHR and other democratic organizations and establishments since May 1999, when the interim period, according to the Oslo Accords, ended together with the legal term of the presidency of the PNA and the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC), elected during the general elections of January 1996. The 60-day period will be enough at best only for meeting the requirements of the constitution and holding presidential election. However, holding parliamentary elections needs more time, as the PNA and the Central Election Committee need to make appropriate preparations. The PNA is required to intensify efforts to hold these elections in 2005.

The first step to be taken should be promulgating a new law for elections or amending the existing law issued by the late Palestinian President Yasser Arafat in December 1995, according to which the 1996 elections were held. If this law is suitable for electing a president, it is not so for electing the legislature. It has been widely criticized, as it reinforced the one-party-authority, does not allow representation of small parties and reinforces tribal considerations. In the past few years, the PLC was required to promulgate a new law or amend the existing law, but it has not done. Discussion has continued in the PLC and among parties and NGOs on the nature of the new or amended law has continued. In the context of this discussion, PCHR believes that the new or amended law should ensure:

1. Proportional representation that reflects the Palestinian political spectrum in the legislature and prevents the overwhelming of one party over the parliament.
2. Decreasing the number of electoral bureaus (16 bureaus) to decrease of the influence of tribal considerations over the elections
3. Fair representation of women through positive discrimination, even if temporarily, under which a quota is devoted to women in the PLC.
4. Reconsidering the formation of the Central Election Committee, which organizes and supervises elections and is formed according to a presidential decree pursuant to the election law; to ensure the neutrality of the committee, PCHR suggests amending the Basic Law to form a national election committee, and this constitutional committee can assume the powers of the Higher Local Election Committee, which supervises the elections of local councils and is headed by the Minister of Local Government.