Stories

New NDI Guide Looks at Ways to Curb Electoral Violence

Guatemala has been plagued by electoral violence for decades. It includes intimidation of voters, and harassment, assaults and even assassinations of candidates, their families and activists by organized criminal groups and drug traffickers.

NDI staff member Lila Jaafar testified July 24 before the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the Middle East and North Africa. Subcommittee Chairman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen presided over the hearing, “The Struggle for Civil Society in Egypt.”

“There is still a great hunger for democracy in Egypt – especially among the youth who now recognize that it will take more than street demonstrations to create a more pluralistic and democratic system,” Jaafar said during her testimony.

Candidate debates that bring contenders face to face with voters and each other are increasingly becoming a mainstay of the political landscape.

Across the globe, debate sponsors share the belief that debates benefit new democracies in many ways, including helping voters make informed choices, reducing the potential for violence in countries coming out of civil war, encouraging candidates to focus on issues rather than personality or ethnic differences, and holding elected officials accountable for campaign promises.

Their names are scattered across a map of Nicaragua.

Jaime Peters Flores is vice president of the Municipal Council of Adolescents and Youth in the municipality of Puerto Cabezas-Bilwi.

At the first global event of its kind, election experts from more than 25 countries on five continents came together in Mexico City in early June to discuss ways to promote electoral integrity and strengthen election observation around the world.

The attendees – citizen observers, international observers and election officials – gathered with the goal of enhancing the transparency, accountability and inclusiveness of elections worldwide by forging new channels of communication among the three communities.

Though half of the world’s population, women continue to be underrepresented at all levels of government as voters, party leaders and elected officials. Just over 20 percent of parliamentarians worldwide are women.

In the Arab world, that number is about 16 percent, and it’s lower still in some countries. In Lebanon, for example, one of the earliest places in the region where women gained the right to vote, in 1952, just four of the 128 parliamentarians are women.

NDI mourns the tragic death of Libyan activist Salwa Bughaigis, who was brutally murdered on June 25 in Benghazi after casting her ballot and encouraging other Libyans to participate in elections for a new legislature.

The Internet has transformed the way people communicate — making it simpler to share more information more often and more widely. But that ease can also introduce privacy and security risks for political activists.

Although Mexico passed a federal law on transparency and access to public information in 2002, legislative information is still hard to come by for citizens who want to participate in the policymaking process and hold their governments accountable.

Theresa Kanneh, a 17 year old in her final year at G.W. Gibson High School in Monrovia, stood in front of a group of Liberian senators in the Joint Chamber of the Legislature. She described the poor state of water and sanitation conditions in Liberian schools. Conditions are so poor, she said, that students are forced to relieve themselves in bushes due to a lack of working toilets, interfering with their ability to learn.

New NDI Guide Looks at Ways to Curb Electoral Violence

NDI's Lila Jaafar Testifies Before Congress on "The Struggle for Civil Society in Egypt"

New Website Has Practical Information for Organizing Candidate Debates

Nicaragua Leadership Academy Reunion Connects Young Leaders

Citizen and International Observers, Election Officials Meet to Promote Credible Elections

Madam Parliamentarian Documentary Explores Political Presence of Women In Lebanon

NDI Mourns Death of Libyan Activist Salwa Bughaigis

New Tails Computer Operating System Helps Protect Activists

Mexican Congress Launches New Initiatives to Increase Legislative Transparency

Student's Moving Testimony on Sanitation Sparks Renewed Efforts

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