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EL SALVADOR PRESENTS ELECTORAL REGISTRY TO OAS

El Salvador today presented the database of its electoral registry to the Secretary General of the Organization of American States (OAS), José Miguel Insulza, so that the Organization can undertake a technical review and verification before that country’s March 12 legislative and municipal elections. This initiative – the first of its kind at the OAS – is part of a broader OAS effort to help strengthen El Salvador’s institutions during the 2006 electoral process.

In a separate ceremony today, the Foreign Minister of El Salvador, Francisco Laínez, and the OAS Secretary General signed an agreement related to privileges and immunities granted to members of the OAS Electoral Observation Mission. The mission is headed by Moisés Benamor, Specialist from the OAS Subsecretariat of Political Affairs.

During the presentation of the electoral registry, the President of El Salvador’s Supreme Electoral Tribunal, Walter Araujo, assured Insulza that the electoral institution “reaffirms its democratic conviction and conveys the confidence, transparency and credibility needed to reassure and satisfy the various actors in the process, the people of El Salvador in general and the international community.” Araujo, who was accompanied by four magistrates, thanked the OAS for its “invaluable cooperation” during this entire phase.

Insulza expressed appreciation for the gesture of confidence and transparency shown by the Salvadoran people, through the Electoral Tribunal, in placing the registry in the hands of the OAS, noting that this issue – “the quality, revision, audits and proper functioning of the electoral registry”– is critical in the region’s electoral processes. By submitting its electoral registry for an audit that will be carried out with OAS participation, “El Salvador is setting an example that hopefully other countries of the Americas will follow,” Insulza said.

Referring to the quick-count system that the OAS will undertake on election day, he stressed that it is very important that “the electoral system publish the preliminary results as soon as possible,” and mentioned the recent elections in Costa Rica and Haiti. “This is what has permitted things to remain calm in Costa Rica, even with the differences in the votes, as opposed to what has occurred in Haiti, where delays of more than a week in the delivery of official results have damaged the image that had been achieved the week before in the elections,” Insulza said.

The Permanent Representative of El Salvador to the OAS, Ambassador Abigail Castro de Pérez, and other members of the OAS General Secretariat, also attended the ceremony.

Reference: E-027/06