The Independent National Electoral Commission (CENI) requested the International Organization of the Francophonie (OIF) for an external audit of the Togolese electoral file resulting from the census from April 29 to June 14, 2023. The OIF experts returned this Wednesday 15 November, the conclusions of their work.
According to OIF experts, it should be noted that after the verifications and analyzes carried out, reassuring conclusions on the quality of the Togolese electoral file were delivered; this in terms of reliability of the voter census operation, its biometric nature and its geographical and sociological representativeness in the 39 prefectures of the 05 regions of the country.
The Organization considers that the Togolese electoral register complies with national norms and international standards.
Indeed, it is by a letter dated June 5, 2023 that the CENI through the Minister of Territorial Administration contacted the Secretary General of La Francophonie to request the support of the OIF for the audit of the file electoral of Togo.
» The Secretary General responded favorably. On the basis of these exchanges, the OIF deployed from October 20 to 27, 2023 in Lomé, a team of three (03) experts with the following profiles, a computer scientist, a lawyer and a demographic statistician. The challenge was to determine the conformity of the Togolese file with national norms and international standards based on the criteria of inclusiveness, exhaustiveness, timeliness, uniqueness, accuracy among others,” explained Désiré NYARUHIRIRA, Special Political and Diplomatic Advisor to the Secretary General of the OIF.
He affirmed that the Togolese electoral register is sufficiently reliable to allow the next regional and legislative elections to be held in conditions of confidence.
“The experts noted during file analyzes that there were no duplicates to report. That is to say that there was already preliminary work that had already been done. In the current context within the French-speaking area, it reflects political courage to have chosen transparency on the electoral register by opting for an international audit. This is an operation that certain member countries fear, as the OIF was able to observe recently elsewhere,” said Désiré NYARUHIRIRA before adding that “53.80% of women are registered compared to 46.18% for men. . Through these figures, Togo stands out through this electoral file as an example of inclusion and political participation of women.
After the internal audit, the external audit of the OIF according to Yago DABRE, president of the CENI, allows “to better anchor ourselves in the democratic space, to move forward in this space of democracy where every day, Togo makes its evidence.”
Note that the experts carried out their activities in complete independence by carrying out a rigorous and objective analysis of the legal framework and conventions, the technical and IT framework and the Togolese electoral demographics. They also worked throughout the audit operation using a collaborative approach involving national stakeholders.
From April 29 to June 14, 2023, the CENI carried out an electoral census campaign in three zones across the entire national territory. This census allowed the institution to have 4,432,936,000 potential voters. The CENI thus carried out an internal audit of the file which made it possible to remove all those who should not appear on an electoral list. This deduplication operation made it possible to remove 129,225 voters.
Rachel Doubidji