Word: referendum
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Council members cited the passage of a referendum downsizing the council from about 90 to about 50 members as one reason for organizing a constitutional committee...
Some council members have always thought the constitution needed reworking, but recent developments--from the rejection of a term bill referendum to the impeachment of council Vice President John A. Burton '01--convinced the vast majority of the council to seek constitutional reform...
...more significant, however, in light of next month's presidential elections. Rampant inflation, unemployment and shortages - and the government's costly intervention in the civil war in neighboring Congo - has left the authoritarian president in real danger of being voted out of office. After losing a February referendum on a constitution that would have authorized his land seizures, Mugabe upped the ante by ordering his supporters to simply invade and occupy white-owned farmland. Despite a ruling by the country's high court that these actions are illegal, Mugabe has forbidden the police from evicting squatters from some 600 farms...
Like so many charismatic revolutionaries, Gusmao used his imprisonment as a platform. At his trial in Dili, he called for a vote on East Timor's future: "Whoever is afraid of the referendum is afraid of the truth." He quickly became one of the world's most prominent political prisoners, writing poetry and letters to keep the dream of independence alive. In 1997 Mandela visited and called for his release. A year later, Suharto's successor, B.J. Habibie, surprised everyone--particularly his own military--by taking up Gusmao's challenge of a referendum on full independence for East Timor...
...while Chinese President Jiang Zemin holds (as does the U.S.) that Taiwan is a subset of China. As if to confirm that state of affairs, Chen, speaking in a post-victory speech in Mandarin as a seeming display of respect to China, said he wouldn't hold a national referendum on declaring Taiwanese sovereignty. Meanwhile, Beijing refrained from military action, and issued a statement saying it would take a "wait and see approach" to Chen's policies...