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OAS and IFES Sign Memorandum of Understanding to Strengthen Electoral Observation Systems

The Secretary General of the Organization of American States (OAS), José Miguel Insulza, and the President and CEO of the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES), William Sweeney, signed a Memorandum of Understanding today through which both institutions will strengthen their already established cooperation on electoral observation systems.

During the ceremony, Secretary General Insulza highlighted the collaboration between the OAS and IFES, and the interests shared by the two organizations to strengthen democracy. He recalled that the promotion and defense of democracy is—along with human rights, development, and security—one of the pillars that guide the work of the OAS, thus, making the electoral processes a top priority for the institution. "We have observed elections in the region for over 50 years, and we are proud of our observation system," he said.

In that vein, Secretary General mentioned that electoral observation is a mandate not only explicitly enshrined in the founding Charter of the OAS, but also in the Inter-American Democratic Charter. "This is a task that the OAS will continue to carry out, and to do so with IFES is probably ensuring the best capabilities and the highest quality of electoral observation," he said. With signing the agreement, he concluded, "a good job on electoral matters" will be ensured.

For his part, the President of IFES, William Sweeney, welcomed the signing of the agreement and said “IFES is pleased to partner with the Organization of American States to consider how we can jointly improve the methodologies used to evaluate credible elections. Strong, evidence-based indicators are much needed to assess election quality, as well as to track the impact of reforms and changes to the process over successive election cycles,” he added.

President Sweeney announced that “this partnership will become a model for other partnerships around the world,” and that the union with the OAS through the Memorandum of Understanding “seals a partnership with the OAS so as to continue to define and develop best practices and evaluation standards in the Hemisphere.”

During the signing ceremony held at the OAS headquarters in Washington, DC, the Chair of the Permanent Council of the OAS and Representative of Saint Lucia, Ambassador Sonia Johnny; the Interim Representative of the United States to the Organization, Michael Fitzpatrick; and the Director of the OAS Department of Electoral Cooperation and Observation, Gerardo Hernández de Icaza, among other guest, were present.

A gallery of photos of the event is available here.

The B-Roll of the event is available here.

For more information, please visit the OAS Website at www.oas.org.

Reference: E-360/14