African Union has held three day seminar on electoral boundary delimitation for officials Somali government and the country’s electoral commission.
The meeting which convened officials from federal Government of Somalia, the National Independent Electoral Commission (NIEC) and the federal member states kicked off on Monday in Nairobi, the capital of Kenya.
According to the Political Affairs Department of the African Union Commission, the workshop is brainstorming on the legal and institutional framework for electoral boundary delimitation, use of technology and impact of government and electoral systems on the delimitation.
Ms. Halima Ismail Ibrahim, the Chairperson of Somalia’s National Independent Electoral Commission, lauded efforts by the African Union Commission to educate electoral stakeholders on the critical aspects of elections, boundaries and delimitation, which she noted were intertwined. The NIEC was central to Somalia’s choice of electoral system in the 2016/2017 electoral process.
“If the Somalis are now choosing and selecting their electoral system; it is because of the training we had here,” said Ms. Halima
She also called for cooperation from all stakeholders in preparations for Somalia’s one-person-one vote elections in 2020/2021.
Mr. Guy Cyrille Topiko, the acting head of the Democracy and Electoral Unit at the African Union Commission said 24 participants, who will draw parallels with boundary delimitation in Kenya, Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Tunisia.
“The African Union has the mandate to provide election support to election management bodies of member states. The electoral commission of Somalia is one of our priority institutions in terms of providing long term electoral assistance on the continent,” Mr Topiko said.
Discussion about this post