Observers are delayed as deadline nears in Sudan’s voter registration
November 3, 2009 (WASHINGTON) – An international election monitoring body, the Carter Center, today complained that deployment of observers was stalled due to formalities imposed by an official accreditation process. The news comes just as the one-month voter registration period kicked off on November 1.
The Carter Center has deployed already 12 observers to five regions of Sudan and it hopes to bring in 20 additional observers for the ongoing voter registration period.
But in a statement today the international NGO said it was “concerned that its mission will be compromised if the Center’s observers are not accredited immediately and if regulations are not applied equally to all national and international observer groups.”
The statement implied that its observers were delayed because of paperwork being held at the National Elections Commission (NEC): “Given that voter registration has begun, it is critical that observer accreditation formalities are facilitated without further delay, so that all observers can be deployed…. The NEC should process these applications without further delay.”
Political party agents seeking to register voters similarly have to be accredited, and may be facing the same delay.
Furthermore, the Carter Center said it is “very concerned about continuing reports of harassment of observers and political party and civil society activity, including instances involving some of the Center’s own international observers in Kassala, Eastern Sudan, as well as domestic election observation training activities supported by the Center in the same state.”
Sudan’s long-delayed elections are meant to bring democratic transformation to the country ahead of the 2011 referendum for South Sudan, in accordance with the 2005 agreement that ended Africa’s longest-running civil war.
The NEC, the bi-partisan political body overseeing the implementation of elections, established state high committees in June, but it has yet to transfer adequate funding to them. Some of the committees claim they have not received funds for payment of voter registration officials.
“It would be regrettable in Sudan if restrictions prevented observers from carrying out their work,” the Carter Center stated.
(ST)