Bye, 2021. Hello, 2022: the new year heralds the beginning of a slew of electoral processes around the world, some of which are unimportant in terms of geopolitics, but all of which are essential.

Several significant electoral processes took place in 2021, including the one that resulted in the dismissal of Angela Merkel at the behest of Germany and the elections that led to the replacement of Sebastián Piera, the first right-wing executive democratically elected since 1958 and the first to hold the office since Augusto Pinochet, with the leftist option of Gabriel Boric in Chile.

Numerous democratic windows are opening around the world as the year draws to a close. These include the French elections, in which Emmanuel Macron will face the candidate who will be the first woman to run for president in a French presidential election process, and the elections in Lebanon, which are taking place against the backdrop of a severe political and economic crisis.

January, February and March: Portugal, Colombia …

The first democratic event of the year takes place in Serbia, where a referendum is held on the modification of the Constitution with respect to the judiciary: the Government, with the aim of harmonizing the Judiciary with European legislation, proposed to modify the way of electing judges and prosecutors, a measure that was adopted by a two-thirds majority in the National Assembly in June 2021.

Now it is the citizens’ turn: although this referendum was initially going to be held during the autumn of 2021, at the end of November called for January 16.

For its part, Libya could hold the elections at the beginning of the year that it could not hold on Christmas Eve: with a unity government since March, after a process of talks to unify the opposing administrations, these elections could mark the beginning of the end of the institutional crisis opened in the country in 2014 and the instability it has suffered since the capture and execution, in October 2011, of the then Libyan leader, Muammar Gaddafi. 

However, the committee appointed by the House of Representatives to oversee the process has refused to set a date, recommending putting in place a “realistic” ‘roadmap’ to move forward with the vote. Meanwhile, Portugal was forced to call elections after Parliament rejected – as it was expected to do – the budget law presented by the socialist government of António Costa, which did not win the support of the rest of the forces on the left.

Germany, after the federal elections in September that put an end to the ‘Angela Merkel era’, giving way to a tripartite coalition led by Olaf Scholz, the country embarks on a presidential election in February, four years after the Social Democrat Frank-Walter Steinmeier acceded to the position. 

On February 13, therefore, the 17th Federal Convention is celebrated: each member of the Bundestag can propose candidates for the Presidency – they must be German citizens, over 40 years of age; a sitting president cannot run for a third term — and all of them must accept his nomination. So far, the only declared candidate is Steinmeier himself.

• January 16: constitutional referendum in Serbia
• January 19: elections to the Parliament of Barbados
• January 24: Libyan presidential elections, postponed from December 24
• January 30: elections to the Parliament of Portugal
• February 6: Presidential and parliamentary elections in Costa Rica
• February 13: German presidential elections
• February 13: regional elections of Castilla y León
• February 27: Mali’s parliamentary and presidential elections
• March 9: South Korean presidential elections
• March 13: elections to the Colombian Parliament

The eighth democratic presidential elections are held in South Korea in early March, ending Moon Jae-in’s term after his victory in 2017, a snap election triggered by the removal of then-president Park Geun-hye, daughter of the dictator Park Chung-hee and convicted of an influence peddling scheme. 

The South Korean constitution provides that incumbent presidents cannot run for a second term, as they are restricted to a single term of five years. On the other side of the planet, a few days later elections are held in Colombia, where the members of both houses of Congress will be appointed. Elections in East Timor and Hong Kong are also expected in the first quarter of the year, although a date has yet to be confirmed.

April, May and June: France, Lebanon and the Philippines

In the second quarter of the year, the French population will elect its president for the next five years. The main rival of the current president, Emmanuel Macron, is the Republican Valérie Pécresse, the first woman candidate in the French presidential elections, winner of the primaries against all odds and former minister of Universities in the time of François Fillon. Meanwhile, in the Philippines, Rodrigo Duterte has already withdrawn his candidacy for the Senate, putting an end to what could be his participation in the May elections, after announcing that he would leave politics after his mandate.

Lebanon’s elections, for their part, still run the risk of being postponed due to the current political crisis. In principle, they were going to be March 27, but later they were postponed to May, because the president, Michel Aoun, refused to endorse the first date. 

The electoral workers vote on May 12, while the population is called to the polls on the 15th of the same month. And in America, after the legislative sessions called for March, the presidential ones will take place in May; If a consensus is not reached on this day, a second round of the elections is held in mid-June.

• April 3: Serbian presidential and parliamentary elections
• April 10: Presidential elections in France
• April 24: Parliamentary elections in Slovenia
• May 9: Presidential, Half Senate and House of Representatives elections of the Philippines
• May 15: Lebanese legislative elections
• May 29: Colombian presidential elections
• June 5: elections in six governorships, 39 municipalities and 25 local councils in Mexico
• June 12: French legislative elections (first round)
• June 19: French legislative elections (second round)
• June 19: second round if winning formula is not reached in Colombian presidential elections

In addition to these, the elections in Hungary, Gambia and Australia are also scheduled for this quarter. In Spain, for its part, the autonomous elections of Andalusia could be held in June or, failing that, in October.

Summer is from Sweden

During the summer quarter, the elections will be rather few. Around the August holidays, in September, Sweden’s general elections are held, where the members of the Riksdag will be chosen, who, in turn, will elect the prime minister. Stefan Lofven, who until November 2021 held the post, resigned from it and announced his retirement from politics, giving way to the then-Minister of Finance, Magdalena Andersson, who arrives as the current Prime Minister in the elections.

• July 25: Japanese House of Representatives midterm elections
• August 9: Kenyan presidential and parliamentary elections
• September 11: Swedish parliamentary elections

Other elections are scheduled for the third quarter of the year, still without a fixed date, in Papua New Guinea, Congo, Senegal, Angola, Nauru and Lesotho.

End of the year: ‘midterms’ from the United States, Brazil, Tunisia …

Several elections are planned for the end of the year, although there are many yet to be fixed, which would be held in these months. On October 2 they are expected to take place in Brazil, when the president, vice president and the National Congress will be elected. 

The current president, Jair Bolsonaro, is running for re-election, although for these elections so will PTist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who is running to challenge Bolsonaro for leadership, whom he considers a “fascist” and a “genocidal”. 

According to a survey carried out by the Institute for Research and Communication (IPEC) published in mid-December, Lula da Silva would win the elections with 48% of the votes, compared to 21% who would vote for Bolsonaro.

Also in the American continent but further north, in the United States, Joe Biden faces his first ‘midterms’, in which Americans will vote directly to elect a third of the senators and all the members of the House of Representatives, a total of 435, which are renewed every two years. This type of election is a kind of referendum to validate (or not) the policy carried out by the president, a kind of motion of no confidence in which the voter decides if he wants to continue with the path set from Washington.

Meanwhile, in Tunisia, the suspension of Parliament has been extended until the elections are held in December, after a political process that would allow a referendum to be held on July 25. 

Thus, with the beginning of 2022, a political process of consultations through digital platforms begins and that will include “specific questions”, until March 20: at this time a commission will analyze and summarize the protests too, at the end of June, raise a Specific proposal that will be submitted to a referendum during the month of July. Subsequently, a new electoral law will be promoted, which will govern the call for elections for December.

• October 1: elections to the Latvian Parliament
• October 2: Parliamentary and collegiate presidential elections in Bosnia and Herzegovina
• October 2: presidential and parliamentary elections in Brazil
• November 8: US ‘midterm’ elections
• December 17: parliamentary elections in Tunisia

Still far from this moment, the dates of other elections have yet to be determined, such as those in Peru, Austria, Bahrain, Equatorial Guinea, or Fiji. Others that do not have a date but are scheduled for the year 2022 are the elections in Haiti, Chad, Malta and Nepal.

*This information is subject to modifications, cancellations or postponements, depending on the decisions made by each Government.

Image Credit: Getty

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