Abuja — A 75-member ECOWAS Observer Mission will return to Cape Verde for the second round of the country's presidential elections. The observers are expected to be deployed in all the nine habitable islands of the country. T
he Mission will be led by Mr. David Adenze Kangah, the Deputy Chairman of Ghana's Electoral Commission who also led a fact-finding mission to Cape Verde last June and the 7th August 2011 first round presidential election. Mr. Kangah will be joined on re-election day by the President of the ECOWAS Commission, Ambassador James Victor Gbeho, who was also part of the Observer Mission to the first round of the presidential poll. Members of the Mission include Ambassadors accredited to ECOWAS, representatives of the ECOWAS Council of the Wise, civil society organizations, the ECOWAS Parliament and Court of Justice, electoral experts and representatives of electoral commissions from Community Member States.
Under its Supplementary Protocol on Democracy and Good Governance, ECOWAS is required to send fact-finding and observer missions to Member States conducting presidential elections as part of efforts to ensure democratic convergence across West Africa. These missions also enable ECOWAS to determine appropriate assistance to be provided such States toward ensuring the conduct of free, transparent and credible elections in the region