Elections to the Legislative Council were held in the

Colony of Aden Aden Colony () was a crown colony of the United Kingdom from 1937 to 1963 located in the southern part of modern-day Yemen. It consisted of the port city of Aden and also included the outlying islands of Kamaran, Perim and the Khuria Muria ...

on 4 January 1959."Aden Elections To-Morrow" ''The Times'', 3 January 1959, p10, issue 54349

Background

In the previous elections in 1955 only four of the

Legislative Council A legislative council is the legislature, or one of the legislative chambers, of a nation, colony, or subnational division such as a province or state. It was commonly used to label unicameral or upper house legislative bodies in the Brit ...

's 18 seats were elected.Sheila Carapico (2007) ''Civil Society in Yemen: The Political Economy of Activism in Modern Arabia'' Cambridge University Press, p86 This was raised to 12 elected seats on an enlarged

of 23 members. The colony was divided into five constituencies, each electing two or three members. Restrictions on suffrage led to only 21,500 people being registered to vote from a population of 180,000. Of the remaining 11 members of the Council, five were ''ex officio'' and six were nominees. Five of the members (at least three of which had to be elected member) would be appointed "Members in charge" by the Governor, and would have responsibility for government departments. A total of 31 candidates contested the election, with between five and seven in each constituency.

Results

Of the 12 elected members, nine were Arabs, two were Somalis and one was Indian. All were described as "aging, pro-British and moneyed". Only 6,000 votes were cast, following calls for a boycott by the Aden Trade Union Congress, with voter turnout at just 27%."6,000 Go To The Polls In Aden" ''The Times'', 6 January 1959, p6, issue 54351 Turnout varied from 43% in

Crater A crater is a landform consisting of a hole or depression (geology), depression on a planetary surface, usually caused either by an object hitting the surface, or by geological activity on the planet. A crater has classically been described ...

to 15% in

Sheikh Othman Sheikh Othman () is a district of the Aden Governorate, Yemen. As of 2003, the district had a population of 105,248 inhabitants. History Sheikh Othman derives its name from a religious shrine for Sheikh Othman Al-Zubairi Al-Wahki. The shrine is ...

– Little Aden.

Elected members

The winning candidates were all independents, and received between 902 and 207 votes: *Saidi (902 votes) *Kudabax Khan (854 votes) *Bayoumi (704 votes) *Salole (663 votes) *Ali Lukman (637 votes) *Saidi Hussain (580 votes) *Abdullah Binswalla (567 votes) *K Joshi (543 votes) *Ali Awan Moulhi (521 votes) *Maktari (440 votes) *Husaini (368 votes) *Mustaffa Abdullah (207 votes)

Aftermath

Despite the pro-British nature of the elected members, the

only narrowly approved joining the

Federation of South Arabia The Federation of South Arabia (FSA; ') was a federal state under British protectorate, British protection in what would become South Yemen. Its capital was Aden. History Originally formed on April 4, 1962 from 15 states of the Federation ...

References

{{Yemeni elections

Aden Aden () is a port city located in Yemen in the southern part of the Arabian peninsula, on the north coast of the Gulf of Aden, positioned near the eastern approach to the Red Sea. It is situated approximately 170 km (110 mi) east of ...

Elections in Yemen 20th century in the Colony of Aden

Election and referendum articles with incomplete results January 1959 in Asia