PHOTO: First-time voters in Montserrado County District #2
Young women Actions for Rights, Peace and Development (YWARPD) has appreciated voters, especially first-time voters and young women, for turning out to vote on October 10, 2023, a press release from the group says.
YWARPD S also commends the National Elections Commission (NEC) for successfully running the Election Day. YWARPD believe that the Election Day was marked by massive voter turnouts and relatively peaceful electoral environment. In spite of this, YWARPD observed a number of minor issues, but these did not undermine the tenor of success that characterized the Day.
As part of its project tilted “Mobilizing First Time Voters to Espouse Democratic Values, which is sponsored by the national Endowment for Democracy (NED), YWARPD trained and deployed 51 trained Election Monitors/Observers who worked to carry out civic and voters’ education fin 17 Electoral District in Montserrado County and to also observe the elections. Regarding the Election Day monitoring/observation, YWARPD’s Observers visited a number places in rural and urban locations. Some of our election monitors/observers were embedded at the polling centers while others rotated among centers. YWARPD was keen to monitoring the overall administration of the Election Day with attention to first time voter participation and gender related issues.
Below is a summary of the key results from YWARPD’s election observation mission:
- Running of the Election Day by NEC: all technical aspects of the Election Day were well handled by NEC but there were a minor issues. For example, in many polling centers, YWARPD observed there was no signs directing voters where to go to vote. As a result, some voters who stood in the wrong queues for hours became frustrated and wanted to abandon the process. It is possible that other voters who experienced this same situation may have become frustrated and left. While the number of persons affected by this may be small, it is important to note this for future elections. Additionally, the waiting time at many polling places were long, causing the actual voting process to finish as late as 8:00 P.M in some stations.
- Voters turn out and electoral environment: There were massive voter turnouts and a relatively calm electoral environment with significant security presence in all the polling centers visited. The polling centers were mostly opened earlier than 7:00 A.M and voting started at 8:00 A.M. or sometimes 10 minutes late. Meanwhile, we observed covert campaign activities in some of the polling centers.
- Gender-aware and infrastructural issues: YWARPD noticed that NEC staff was gender balanced in each polling place visited and the polling officers at a number of polling places were women. Meanwhile, running of the Election Day was seemingly not mostly gender-aware. For example, elderly woman and men, as well as people living with disabilities (PLWDs) were often not prioritized to vote both by voters and by NEC staff.
- Presence of Independent Election Observers: YWARPD noted a significance presence Additionally, we encountered international observers from the mano River union, Economic community of West African States (ECOWAS), the European Union, the United States of America Embassy and several national NGOs.
- Vote counting and transmittal of ballots to NEC’s office: All the vote counting processes were observed by SYWARPD’s observers who reported that the exercises were transparent and there was no challenged ballots or unresolved discrepancy. Particularly, the processes of reconciling and sorting the ballots, recording the number of invalid votes and unused ballots, counting the total votes cast and tallying them took place in the public glare of observers. After the vote counting processes, the ballot papers were placed and sealed in the ballot boxes and the serial numbers announced in the view and hearing of all observers. The tally or summative result sheet of each category of candidates were completed, verified, copies shared with representatives of candidates with the highest votes. Thee copies of the completed tally sheet was then posted outside the polling place on the bulletin board, accessible to all. Following these processes, the ballot boxes were transmitted to NEC’s local offices.
- Invalid Votes. YWARPD is concern about the number of invalid reports and called for more voter’s education during the second round of the voting process.
- In view of the above, YWARPD concludes q that the Election Day was very successful with massive turnouts, free and transparent but had minor glitches. This demonstrates the commitment of electorates and NEC to a core democratic tenet – elections. Meanwhile, YWARPD encourages the National Election Commission to continue to guarantee the integrity and neutrality of the electoral process and requests all candidates to accept the official results that announced by NEC or address peacefully any complaint through the court.YWARPD looks forward to observing the second round of the election and wishes to express its thank and support to the national Endowment for Democracy (NED) for its generous support to its programs