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Commonwealth Experts for Seychelles Presidential Election

19 July 2006

Commonwealth experts, appointed by Commonwealth Secretary-General Don McKinnon, will begin their observation of the presidential election in Seychelles on 20 July 2006.

The experts are O J Jallow, Acting Secretary-General and Party Leader, People’s Progress Party, The Gambia; Linnette Vassell, community development and gender specialist, and Chair, Women’s Resource Centre, Jamaica; and Mooroogessen Veerasamy, Principal Electoral Officer, Mauritius.

The experts will be briefed by the Electoral Commissioner, representatives of political parties, civil society organisations, Commonwealth diplomats and other election observers. They will observe preparations for the presidential election -- the polling, counting and results processes -- and the overall electoral environment.

The decision to send the Commonwealth Expert Team follows an invitation from the Electoral Commissioner. The Secretary-General sent Commonwealth Secretariat staff members for the 2001 Presidential Election. A Joint Commonwealth/La Francophonie Observer Group was present for the Presidential and National Assembly Elections in March 1998.

Commonwealth Observer Groups were also sent to the Presidential and National Assembly Elections of July 1993 and to both the Elections to the Constitutional Commission and the Referendum on the Draft Constitution in 1992.

After the 2006 Presidential Election, the Expert Team will submit a report to the Commonwealth Secretary-General, who will in turn send it to the Government of Seychelles, the Electoral Commissioner, the political parties and all Commonwealth governments. The report will then be made public.