LIBERIA GENERAL POLLS GET HIGH RATING FROM EU OBSERVERS
LIBERIA GENERAL POLLS
GET HIGH RATING FROM EU OBSERVERS
Monrovia, Liberia - June 22, 2013: Football game organized
by George Wea at SKD. (Photograph by Morgana Wingard).
The European Union Election
Observation Mission (EU EOM) to Liberia has rated Tuesday’s Presidential and
House of Representatives elections in the West African country high.
In its preliminary report released on
Thursday, the mission said the “overall conduct of the voting was generally
assessed as either good or very good”.
Maria Arena, the Chief Observer of
the EU EOM and member of the European Parliament, presented the report to
journalists in Monrovia, the nation’s capital.
This came barely 24 hours after the
exercise received favourable verdicts from the ECOWAS and African Union
observation missions.
“The EU EOM conducted 336
observations on election day, visiting a total of 297 polling stations.
“The overall assessment of the
conduct of the opening procedures was good or very good.
“Eighty-nine per cent of polling
places observed opened on time or with half an hour delay”, the report said.
She said that the overall conduct of
the voting was also generally rated as either good or very good by the
observers.
The secrecy of the ballot was upheld
in 97 per cent of the polling places observed by the officials in spite of
overcrowding noticed in many polling centres, Ms. Arena said.
“Observers reported that 91 per cent
of the polling places closed on time or within one hour so that queuing voters
could cast their ballot.
“EU EOM observers assessed that the
closing and counting procedures were generally good, very good and that in 78
per cent polling places observed, the counting process was assessed as
transparent.”
She said the report, however, noted
some “issues”, which were not specified, were observed during sorting of ballot
papers and recording of the figures in the forms in some places.
