ECOWAS gifts Sierra Leone $500,000 for polls, deploys 95 observers

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ECOWAS gifts Sierra Leone $500,000 for polls, deploys 95 observers

The President, Economic Community of West African States Commission, His Excellency, Omar Touray, has approved $500,000 in financial support for Sierra Leone’s presidential and parliamentary elections fixed for June 24.

The commission, in a statement on Thursday, added that it was deploying 95 observers for the elections.

The statement noted that the deployment of observers was in line with provisions of Articles 12 to 14 of the 2001 Regional Supplementary Protocol on Democracy and Good Governance on Assistance to Member-States Holding Elections.

According to the statement, the ECOWAS Election Observation Mission will be led by former ECOWAS Commission President and ex-Special Representative of the United Nations Secretary-General and Head of the UN Office in West Africa and the Sahel, Mohamed Chambas, with former ECOWAS Representative in Liberia and Guinea-Bissau, Ansumana Ceesay, to serve as Deputy Head of Mission.

The mission will be assisted by a technical team to be led by the ECOWAS Commissioner for Political Affairs, Peace and Security, Abdel-Fatau Musah.

“The deployment of the Election Observation Mission is a follow-up to the joint ECOWAS and African Union pre-election fact-finding mission to Sierra Leone from April 12-14, 2023,” the statement noted.

Thirteen candidates from 17 registered political parties,including incumbent President Julius Bio, are vying for the Sierra Leone presidency.

Bio’s Sierra Leone People’s Party defeated the then-ruling All People’s Congress in the last presidential election in 2018.

Some 135 parliamentary and 493 local council seats will also be in contention on June 24.

The Electoral Commission for Sierra Leone registered 3,374,258 voters for the 2023 elections out of an estimated population of 8.7 million.

Voting will take place in 11,832 polling stations within 3,630 polling centers across the 16 electoral districts nationwide from 7:00am to 5:0pm.