Tanzania's main opposition party, the Civic United Front (CUF), has asked the United Nations secretary-general to intervene in the country's general elections slated for next year, local press reported Thursday.

Eight CUF parliamentarians led by their leader in the parliament, Wilfred Lwakatare, on Wednesday delivered a letter to Dar es Salaam-based United Nations Development Program office. Theletter is to be forwarded to Kofi Annan, local newspaper The Guardian said.

The CUF letter asked the UN secretary-general to intervene in the election process especially in Zanzibar to ensure that elections are held in a free and fair environment.

The letter also complained about delays of reforms agreed upon in 2001 between CUF and the ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi (party of the revolutionary).

The reforms should have been implemented in such fields as jurisdiction, police, other state organs, publicly-owned media institutions, and the Zanzibar Electoral Commission, the letter was quoted as saying.

The letter cited as an example of such delays the postponement of voters registration on Zanzibar. The registration, to be part of Tanzania's Permanent National Voters Register scheme, has been postponed from now to two months later due to renovation works of the Zanzibar Electoral Commission's offices on the Indian Ocean island.

Multiparty politics was introduced in the country in 1992 whileone-party rule ended in 1995 with the country's first general elections in which the Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) won 85 percent of the ballots. CCM won again in the 2000 general elections among a dozen political groups.

Zanzibar, an Indian Ocean archipelago, joins Tanganyika on April 26, 1964 to form the United Republic of Tanzania. The island elects its own president and legislature.

Source: Xinhua