ECOWAS DEPLOYS 163 OBSERVERS FOR THE GUBERNATORIAL AND STATE ASSEMBLY ELECTIONS

The Economic Community of West African States, is deploying an ECOWAS Election Observation Mission (ECOWAS-EOM) to monitor the Gubernatorial and State Assembly Elections on Saturday, 18 March 2023.

A statement by the commission in Abuja says the deployment of the one hundred and sixty-three (163) observers is in line with the ECOWAS Supplementary Protocol on Democracy and Good Governance.

It explains that the observers will be drawn from the Community Institutions (the Commission, Parliament, and the Court of Justice); West African Ambassadors accredited to ECOWAS; Member States’ Electoral Commissions and Ministries of Foreign Affairs; and electoral experts from civil society.

It will also include a thirteen-member Core Team of electoral experts that has been in the country prior to the presidential and national assembly elections.

It satates that the 163-member ECECOWAS Election Observation Mission will be deployed from 15 to 21 March 2023 to eighteen (18) States, identified on the basis of a technical assessment and analysis of trends and hotspots, to physically and remotely monitor the elections.