UN-led process to nominate Iraqi electoral commissioners on track

The United Nations-led exercise to gather nominations for posts in Iraq's Independent Electoral Commission is progressing on track, UN officials said today.

The nomination period for the seven-person Commission, which will be the exclusive authority to organize and conduct Iraq's transitional elections, will close on 15 May. The appointment of the Electoral Commissioners and the Chief Electoral Officer is scheduled for 31 May.

Nominations for the posts are already being received through manual submission at governorate locations and via e-mail. Women's groups, academia, professional associations, political parties and other civil organizations have expressed strong interest in the exercise.

Five thousand nomination forms and 600,000 leaflets advertising the process have been distributed throughout Iraq so far, and another 5,000 forms will be distributed shortly. Iraqis are being encouraged to photocopy and widely share nomination forms with interested people. Information and forms can be found at a web site set up for that purpose.

UN electoral officials said violence in some locations has not stopped efforts to distribute nomination forms or leaflets about the process. However, violence has hampered efforts to provide access to all local Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) sites for Iraqis to deliver nominations. Nonetheless, nominees or someone on their behalf can submit nomination forms at any accessible governorate location or via e-mail.

Several visits conducted by the UN electoral team sent to monitor the process report that Iraqis have expressed a high level of interest in participating. The UN team is randomly visiting CPA sites to verify that the procedures to ensure secrecy of information for nominees are applied, and to monitor progress.

UN officials have emphasized that the creation of the Independent Electoral Commission is an essential step toward the holding of elections in Iraq.