By Chernor Alimamy Kamara
The Electoral Commission of Sierra Leone (ECSL) is on the move for ensuring electoral reforms ahead of the 2023 elections.
According to the Executive Secretary of ECSL, William Addo Davies, after every general election in Sierra Leone, there is an electoral circle that needs reflection and during that period, the commission found out challenges and learnt lessons.
‘’We have partners like the Elections Observation Partners that observed the 2018 elections that came out with recommendations and some of those recommendations called for electoral legal reforms,’’ he said.
He noted that the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) funded a lessons learnt workshop for stakeholders which recommended legal reforms. He said one of the recommendations was to set up a National Task Force to monitor the implementation of the recommendations.
Davies pointed out that the task force comprises all the Political Parties, National Elections Watch (NEW) and some relevant Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) including the Security Sector, the Judiciary and the Ministry of Finance. ‘’That was the beginning of the discussions of the electoral legal reforms and post 2018 electoral circle,’’ he said.
He stated that as early as last year August, the commission with financial support from the European Union organized the National Electoral Legal Reform Conference which brought together all the political parties, CSOs and the main players in the election business which in the end led to the signing of a communiqué.
He said the key highlight was a general consensus that a fixed date be set for all general elections in the country.
He referenced Section 43 of the constitution which states that Presidential time for the elections should be set within a 7-month window; which could be as early as 4 months before the end of the tenure of the President, but not within one month to the end.
‘’It could also be as late as 3 months after the expiration of the tenure of the president. So the process involves the Electoral Commission negotiating or consulting with the President before a decision is reached whether the date should be set before the tenure ends or after it ends,’’ said Davies.
The ECSL Executive Secretary recalled some frictions they had in 2017 to set the 2018 elections date which he said came out in all of the observation reports. ‘’So we think it is time for us to make the proposal to Parliament before the time approaches,’’ he said.
It must be noted that no-fixed date has been identified for the holding of elections as a parliamentary debate is ongoing on the Public Elections Act.
He said they also proposed amending the Public Elections Act f ahead of the 2023 elections.
The ECSL scribe pointed out that another issue discussed at the conference was the issue of dual citizenship. ‘’So in that conference, the majority agreed that people with dual citizenship should be allowed to contest parliamentary elections but not Presidential,’’ he said.
Copyright © 2022 Politico Online (15/07/22)
