The Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) Thursday
faced the joint session of the Public Accounts Committee and Public Enterprises
Committee (PAC/PEC) of the National Assembly to present the institution’s
financial statement and activities report for the year 2013.
Flanked by IEC senior officials, Alhagie Mustapha L. Carayol, chairman of the IEC, said the report highlights the main activities of the Electoral Commission during the year under review.
Among the issues highlighted in the report is the major gains made in capacity building, he said.
According to the IEC official, several employees of the commission have benefited from sponsorship from the Commission to further their education at the University of The Gambia, with majors in various fields.
In infrastructural development, he added, the report highlights the “lack of funds that has been a hindrance to the implementation of certain works.”
The IEC Chairman, however, told the PAC/PEC that during the year under review, members of the commission and staff participated in different electoral observation missions in countries such as Togo, Zimbabwe, Mali, Guinea and India.
As detailed in the report, all these missions aided the improvement of the electoral process in variety of ways, he said.
The commission also benefited from various seminars and conferences, in areas such as strategic and financial planning, election management, preventing and responding to electoral violence in West Africa and training on media and elections.
The commission’s major activity during this period was the planning and conducting of the Local Government Elections, Carayol announced.
These, he noted, included vigorous voter education activities aimed at increasing awareness on the importance of elections for greater participation by the electorate, but as the report shows, the issue of a low voter turnout came to the forefront.
