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In Report, Electoral Observation Mission in Paraguay Highlights Calmness, Transparency, and Effectiveness in Constitutional Referendum

The Permanent Council of the Organization of American States (OAS) today received a report from the Electoral Observation Mission in Paraguay led by the former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Colombia, Noemi Sanin, and made up of 13 international observers who accompanied the Constitutional Referendum of October 9th to approve or reject voting by Paraguayans living abroad.

The report detailed the activities and meetings held by the Mission since its arrival on October 6, among them, the meetings with President Fernando Lugo, the Ministers of the Superior Electoral Court of Justice, members of Congress, elections officers, political and governmental authorities, and representatives of the national and international communities, as well as other electoral observation groups.

“The electoral process took place completely calmly and normally. In most electoral districts, security forces were present and duly trained to ensure that voters could exercise their civic duty. No incidents related to the electoral process were reported," said the report presented today to the plenary of the Council that also highlights the “fast process of tallying and transmission of the results.”

The Head of the Mission, which was deployed throughout the country on Election Day, reported that the process started without further delay and stressed the “timely delivery of elections materials by the TSJE and the early set up of the polling stations." Likewise, she welcomed the initiative to create a contingency plan in case polling officers did not appear to fulfill their functions and noted that among the substitutes for absent members there was "a high female presence."

The report also reflected the mission’s observations and recommendations regarding the Electoral Court’s decision to implement three pilot projects: inclusion of the voter’s photograph in the electoral; a system for checking the voter’s identity and the implementation of the so-called “gender lists." The Mission recognized that the intention of these pilot projects was to improve security in identifying voters and to modernize the systems related to the process, and encouraged to broaden them to the entire country and to improve the information contained in the finger print database in the means available for making comparisons.

The conclusions presented by the Chief of Mission reflected a concern with “the high level of abstention," and thus recommended to step up awareness of the electoral process in order to increase citizen participation in this important popular decision-making mechanism. The Mission also said that the system used for tallying the preliminary results “does not provide the security needed for a procedure of this nature, since it does not have an effective system for authentication, verification and audit.”

The Alternate Representative of Paraguay to the OAS, Juan Miguel Gonzalez Bibolini, thanked the OAS and the team that integrated the Mission and said that the first constitutional referendum in his country "was a milestone for democracy" in the country as well as "an opportunity in which citizens and public authorities demonstrated their commitment to it." "The result is the achievement of a long-cherished desire of fellow citizens forced by socio-economic or political situations that forced them to seek better opportunities elsewhere," he said.

A gallery of photos of the event is available here.

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

Reference: E-952/11