Many Nigerians hope that general elections scheduled for next year will mark a turning point for their country.  Since the end of military rule in 1999, elections have been held every four years, but they have been progressively marred by egregious and pervasive fraud, making each poll less credible than the previous one. Dissatisfaction with the last elections, held in 2007, resulted in extensive violence that led to more than 200 deaths and diminishing citizen confidence in democratic institutions and processes.

Kyrgyzstan's Oct. 10 parliamentary elections were conducted in a democratic, transparent and peaceful manner, according to the findings of the country's leading domestic election monitoring organization, the Coalition for Democracy and Civil Society, as well as the international monitoring group the European Network of Election Monitoring Organizations (ENEMO). ENEMO is a network of nonpartisan election monitoring groups from the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.

Noting heightened interest and determination among Nigerians to overcome the nation's history of flawed elections, a pre-election assessment mission conducted by NDI also identified a number of hurdles that could undermine a successful process surrounding next year's state and national polls.

As Egypt prepared for parliamentary elections last month, Partners in Change (PIC), a coalition of 27 grassroots organizations, conducted an innovative voter education and get-out-the-vote campaign.