Ammon News - AMMONNEWS - Minister of State for Media Affairs and Communications, Rakan al-Majali, said on Saturday that those who want a better election law must be democratic from the very moment and receptive of the opinions of others, away from self-interest in order to achieve the consensus everyone advocates.

Responding to criticism against the new draft elections law, Al-Majali said in a stament to Petra that the bill is not a "sacred text", but a governemnt's endeavor in which it sought a broader cosnesnus among components of the Jordanian society.

The minister, who is also the government's spokesperson, added that the government, while drafting the text, took into account that the new legislation must be all-encompassing rather than limited to achieving the demands of certain groups at the expense of the others.

Regretfully, some reactions were hasty and some people did not read the draft very well, while others deliberately avoided the facts reflected in articles of the law, Al-Majali said.

He stressed that the government, through the adoption of the party-list, sought to ensure partisan presence in the coming legislature but without having a certain group encroaching on the others.

Al-Majali affirmed that the govrnemnt will not make any "adventurous" suggestion untill it wins a national consensus which is possible in this stage of the law-endorsment and within constitutional frames, adding the government does not consider the current bill as the "best and finest", but it sees it as a big step forward.

The minister asserted that the independent elections commission and the electoral system, which will be adopted later, will act as a guarantor of the integrity and fairness of the electoral process and will lay the foundations for a true democracy.

"Those who are keen on improving the law should direct their useful and productive criticism, not nihilistic criticism, to the draft's provisions and not towards the government," Al-Majali said.



*Petra