Institute Also Working with Candidates, Political Parties, Polling Agents and Domestic Monitors

NDI has announced its international observation mission for the Sept. 18 elections for Afghanistan's Wolesi Jirga, the lower house of the National Assembly.

The Institute is mobilizing more than 140 international and Afghan observers who will monitor every aspect of the election process, including the campaign, balloting on election day and the counting of ballots. The delegation will issue a preliminary statement in the days following the election.

Despite recent violence and significant challenges ahead, Kyrgyzstan has made progress on democratic reforms, NDI Vice Chair and former U.S. Senate Majority Leader Thomas Daschle concluded following a recent trip to that country.

"Georgian women cannot wait another century for equal participation in the governance of our country," said Leila Aptsiauri, a member of a local city council in Georgia. She was speaking at a conference in Tbilisi, the capital, where representatives from 11 political parties discussed with civil society leaders the benefits to including more women on candidate lists and in political party leadership structures.

For young people in East Africa seeking to have a political voice, the two-year-old Regional Youth Leadership Academy (RYPLA) has helped show the way. One of its graduates, Daniel Taabu, has become executive director of the National Rainbow Coalition-Kenya (NARC-K), a political party with a seat in parliament. In Uganda, 14 graduates started Uganda Youth Stand Up, a nonprofit organization whose goal is to increase civic participation by registering one million young Ugandans to vote ahead of the February 2011 elections.