National Electoral Commission (NEC) with support of the European Union organizes a Gender and Disability mainstreaming training for its staff

Dates:   January 28 –30, 2020; Venue:     New Brookfields Hotel (NBH), Freetown, Sierra Leone

The Gender Section of the NEC in collaboration with the EU Governance programme and with funding from the European Union, on 28-30 January 2020 commenced the Gender and Disability Mainstreaming Training programme for the staff of the NEC as part of its efforts to help raise participants awareness about the inclusion process. This training is an integral part of the NEC’s gender and disability policies recently adopted for further promotion of gender and disability mainstreaming in public and electoral processes.

The 2018 elections observation missions reported that 2018 elections marked no progress in the increase of women participation in the 2018 elections and women remain significantly underrepresented in executive and elected positions. The NEC is taking advantage of the post-election period to address gaps noted as challenges in the previous elections, therefore, in its aspiration to deliver next elections that are more inclusive, the NEC with support from the European Union organizes targeted training courses with the main objectives to raise the participants’ awareness about equal participation of women and people with disabilities in electoral processes and support NEC to engage with state institutions, political parties and electoral stakeholders to ensure more women and people with disabilities are involved in forthcoming elections as voters, contestants and electoral staff.

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Support to the NEC is an integral part of the financial agreement signed between the European Union and the Republic of Sierra Leone in October 2017 to ensure the continuation of the partner support to the NEC in the post-election period. Funded by the 11^th European Development Fund, Hulla and Co. Human Dynamics KG was contracted by the European Union to implement the EU Support to the Governance Sector Technical Assistance to Sierra Leone in the areas of Civil Service Reform, Parliament and the Electoral Cycle programme with the overall objective to strengthen democracy in Sierra Leone. The purpose of the programme is to assist the beneficiary country to deliver specific results in support to the electoral cycle, parliament and civil service sector.