It is beyond doubt that democratic election in a given country shall meet certain criteria. A democratic election shall live up to the international process and principles of democratic election. Speaking of basic international processes and principles presupposes the existence of a constitution. The standard requires the existence of constitutionally recognized independent election commission and specifies the frequency of election and requirement of the political parties to play the game by the rules of the country. It is also stated as one of the international standards that post election evaluation should be conducted shortly after the independent election commission or board announced the winner party.
It is known that Ethiopia has hosted fair, free, peaceful, democratic and legitimate general election in 2010. Meanwhile, it is important to conduct a post election evaluation in order to identify strengths and weaknesses and this is the reason why the board conducted the first post election evaluation.
The evaluation was conducted under the patronage of the National Electoral Board of Ethiopia and it aimed at identifying the weak and strong sides of the fourth general election and rectifying the weakness and capitalizing on the strength for holding free, fair, peaceful, democratic and legitimate elections in the future.
Questionnaire needed for this evaluation were prepared in collaboration with the central statistics authority in a scientific and easily understandable and answerable manner.
The main points included in the questionnaire are the structure, accessibility and security of election centers and election offices ,the process of voters’ and candidates’ registration, civics and voters awareness ,the right to elect and the participation of women in election; competence and impartiality of election officers; working relationship and exchange of information between the board and stakeholders; election campaign, complaint handling procedure, election law, voting process, vote counting and announcement of results, etc…
The data were collected during the post 2010 election evaluation from 77 zones of the nine regions and two city administrations using the statistical sampling method. 18,881 persons including voters, election officers, public observers, justice organs at different level, administrative organs, mass media, civic societies and political parties from the sampled 154 constituencies and 916 polling stations responded to the questionnaire.
This questionnaire completed by the stakeholders has been collected from all regions of the country compiled by statisticians using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS). After the compilation of the evaluation result, the board presented the draft to stakeholders and included their feedback.
The significance of the post election evaluation is to enable the board understand the desire of the voters and improve its election procedures so as to increase their participation and boost the role of political parties. It will also enable the attainment of international principles of election for developing the democratization process of the country.
As a result, the compiled evaluation result created the capacity to identify the weaknesses and strengths observed in the 2010 national election, to identify loopholes in the election law and its implementation for indicating legal and procedural modifications and formulate the next strategy on the basis of the evaluation.
One of the values advocated by the board is to follow the trend of consultation with all stakeholders and accept appropriate feedbacks as inputs to capitalize on the strength and rectify the openings. The Board held consultations with political parties on issued regulations and directives, financial subsidy and airtime allocated to parties and election time schedule, etc… this is an indication that the board has forged a solid relationship with stakeholders.
The 2010 post election evaluation enables the Board secretariat to recognize its strength, weakness, opportunities and challenges whereby, resuming the strength and rectifying weakness, using opportunities exhaustively and reducing possible challenges. As a result, it will have a huge contribution in ensuring the freeness, fairness, peacefulness, democratic and legitimacy of future elections.
It is a known fact that Ethiopia registered all round growth in the past consecutive years. The government has formulated the five years Growth and Transformation Plan to capitalize on these gains. In this regard, the 2010 post election evaluation result will have huge contribution in solidifying its responsibilities laid down in the plan.
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