NDI Fields Pre-Election Assessment Mission for Morocco's Parliamentary Elections

NDI announced on Oct. 20 the arrival of an international delegation to observe the pre-election environment in Morocco as voters register to vote in the country’s Nov. 25 parliamentary elections.

Members of the multinational delegation are Francesca Binda, NDI resident senior director in the West Bank and Gaza (Canada); Pedro Sánchez Pérez-Castejón, member of parliament (Spain); Tova Andrea Wang, senior democracy fellow at Demos (USA); and Jeffrey England, NDI resident director in Morocco (USA).

The goals of the delegation are to express the international community’s interest in, and support for, democratic governance and competitive multiparty elections in Morocco, and to provide an impartial and accurate report on that process to Moroccans and the international community. The parliamentary elections will be the first since unprecedented popular demonstrations and a historic constitutional revision earlier this year.

The delegation will meet in Rabat with representatives of major political parties, officials of the Ministry of Interior, which is organizing the elections; the National Human Rights Council, which is charged with coordinating observer accreditation; government officials; civic leaders; citizen observers; media and representatives of the international community. Delegation members also will hold a series of meetings with local government representatives, activists and political leaders from around the country.

The delegation will conduct its activities in a nonpartisan manner in accordance with Moroccan law and international standards for election monitoring set forth in the Declaration of Principles for International Election Observation.

NDI also will field a team of 10 long-term observers in late October, followed by approximately 30 short-term observers who will deploy around the country to observe the voting on Nov. 25.

In 2007, NDI fielded pre-election and election day observer missions for Morocco’s parliamentary elections.

Update: Read the delegation's pre-election statement in English, French or Arabic»

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Published Oct. 21, 2011. Updated Nov. 2, 2011.