{"id":56758,"date":"2015-10-29T11:35:33","date_gmt":"2015-10-29T09:35:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/2015\/10\/the-republic-of-congos-flawed-referendum-process\/"},"modified":"2015-10-29T11:35:33","modified_gmt":"2015-10-29T09:35:33","slug":"the-republic-of-congos-flawed-referendum-process","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/the-republic-of-congos-flawed-referendum-process\/","title":{"rendered":"The Republic of Congo&#8217;s Flawed Referendum Process"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>                        <span dir=\"ltr\"><br \/>\n                                                    WASHINGTON D.C., United States of America, October 29, 2015\/APO (African Press Organization)\/ &#8212;<br \/>\n                                                <\/span><\/p>\n<p>Press Statement<\/p>\n<p>John Kirby<br \/>\nDepartment Spokesperson<\/p>\n<p>Washington, DC<\/p>\n<p>October 28, 2015<\/p>\n<p \/>\n<p>The United States is disappointed by the deeply flawed process that culminated in the recent referendum on a new constitution for the Republic of Congo. The credibility of the referendum process was marred by violence, intimidation, and severe restrictions on basic freedoms. In its aftermath, the United States strongly urges all parties to come together peacefully to participate in an inclusive political dialogue. This dialogue should lead to urgently-needed and agreed-upon electoral reforms which will build confidence in and increase the transparency and credibility of the political process and encourage full participation by all parties. We also call on the Government of Congo to respect its citizens\u2019 rights to freedom of expression, assembly, and association, which are fundamental to a stable, democratic society.<\/p>\n<p><!-- CENTERBLOCK END --><!-- PRN START --><!-- PRN END --><\/p>\n<p \/>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>WASHINGTON D.C., United States of America, October 29, 2015\/APO (African Press Organization)\/ &#8212; Press Statement John Kirby Department Spokesperson Washington, DC October 28, 2015 The United States is disappointed by the deeply flawed process that culminated in the recent referendum on a new constitution for the Republic of Congo. The credibility of the referendum process [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4584],"tags":[428,4585,830],"class_list":{"0":"post-56758","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-africa-news-2","7":"tag-africa","8":"tag-apo","9":"tag-news","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56758","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56758"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56758\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56758"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56758"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56758"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}