OBEC joins Pacific-wide dialogue on election challenges at PIANZEA meeting
The Bougainville Electoral Commission participated in the meeting of PIANZEA – a network of election administrators from the Pacific Islands, Australia and New Zealand, where they discussed the shared challenges of running elections in the region.
The meeting took place in Nuku’alofa in the Kingdom of Tonga, and was noted to be happening at a particularly interesting time, with over half of the world’s population going into the polls in 2024 and Bougainville in 2025.
Newly appointed Bougainville Electoral Commissioner, Desmond Tsianai was also a participant in the meeting.
“Our main focus in attending such gatherings and meetings is to learn as much as we can from well-established election management bodies such as the Australian Electoral Commission and the New Zealand Electoral Commission on how they administer their elections on a day to day basis during election.”
“And from their shared experiences, we can learn and imply few which are applicable to the Bougainville context to our elections in Bougainville,” Commissioner Tsianai said.
Commissioner Tsianai added that said such gatherings and discussions with Election Management Bodies or EMB’s in the Pacific are vital for the Office of the Bougainville Electoral Commissioner as we prepare towards conducting the ABG Elections in 2025.
“Lessons learned from this meeting and others which we (OBEC) have attended will help us in our planning and administration of the 2025 ABG General Elections,” he said.
Meanwhile, PIANZEA Chair and Australia’s Deputy Electoral Commissioner, Jeff Pope said PIANZEA is proud of the strong and enduring partnership between election management bodies in the Pacific, and the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) is proud of Australia’s role in supporting the network.
The meeting was hosted by the Electoral Commission, Kingdom of Tonga, and opened by His Royal Highness, the Crown Prince of Tonga Tupouto’a ‘Ulukalala.
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