Anerood Jugnauth - 1991 and Fourth Tenure

1991 and Fourth Tenure

On 6 August 1991, Jugnauth dissolved the national assembly and announced that a general election would be held on 15 September, nearly a year early. Jugnauth led an alliance of his MSM with the MMM and the RTD against an alliance of the MLP and the PMSD . The MSM/MMM/RTD alliance was better prepared than the opposition. Before the election date had been announced, it had already drawn up its list of candidates for the 20 constituencies, and published its election manifesto. The opposition lost valuable time with lengthy negotiations concerning candidates and manifesto. The latter offered nothing new to the electorate and was broadly similar to the policies put forward by the government. Some 25 parties and independents and 331 candidates were involved. According to official figures, 682 000 voters (about 63% of the total population of 1 083 000) were entitled to vote, and of these about 576 300 (84.5%) turned out (see 1991 National Assembly election results for more detail). The government alliance's 56.3% of the vote gave it 57 seats in parliament, while the opposition's 39.9% of the vote gave it only three seats — an even more glaring discrepancy than in 1987 (see 1987 National Assembly election results). Only four best-loser seats were allocated. Jugnauth once more ruled in the house of parliament for a 4th term and was once more elected Prime Minister reigning over as the Supreme King of politics.