CNE allows OAS to observe March elections

Ecuadornews:

The National Electoral Council (CNE for its acronym in spanish) of Ecuador approved on Monday that the Electoral Observation Mission of the Organization of American States (OAS) will be able to supervise the electoral process for the local elections of March.

The plenary of the electoral body decided that the observation missions of the OAS, the Inter-American Union of Electoral Organizations (Uniore) and A-Web will accompany him during the next elections, in which more than 11,000 local authorities will be elected, including headlines and substitutes, and among them 23 prefects from as many provinces and 221 mayors.

This confirmation comes after a scuffle over controversial statements in January by the president of the electoral body, Diana Atamaint, in which she accused the Electoral Observation Mission of not complying with the CNE regulations during her work in the February 2018 referendum. , accusation that the OAS denied.

At that time, she also announced a change in the regulation on electoral observation in the country, with which the supranational body was concerned in a letter sent to the head of the CNE.

The changes that Atamaint intends to make include that the observation missions cannot interview CNE officials, national authorities, party leaders and candidates, nor register or report disputes, irregular situations or conflicts during the electoral elections.

Some changes that according to the OAS “would make any type of independent and impartial electoral observation impossible”.

At the moment it is unknown if the high official has amended her intention to introduce these changes, and only the invitation itself has been reported.

At the time, the CNE president had also stated that the mission “has to follow up the elections process and not the previous process.”

The OAS recalled in that sense that the procedural agreement agreed with the electoral body establishes that it will guarantee, “during the electoral process and the periods before and after it,” free mobility throughout the Ecuadorian territory, as well as access to the mission to all the areas of the organisms that are part of the electoral system.

Atamaint is scheduled to appear tomorrow, Tuesday, before the International Relations Committee of the Assembly of Ecuador (Parliament) to explain its decisions on the participation of the OAS.

According to the international organization, Ecuador is the member country that has received the most electoral observation missions since the program began in 1968, a total of twenty. (I)

Source: https://www.larepublica.ec/blog/politica/2019/02/11/cne-permite-a-oea-observar-comicios-de-marzo/