This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon, April 12, 2011 - Secretary of State Robin Carnahan, who lost a Senate bid last fall and is expected to run for re-election next year, is traveling to Nigeria to monitor that country's presidential election this Saturday.
Aides say she flew out today and is expected to arrive in Nigeria on Wednesday.
Carnahan is serving as a co-leader of a bipartisan international election observation team organized through the National Democratic Institute. According to her staff, the delegation "will meet with senior government and election officials, political party representatives, candidates, citizen election monitors, civil society leaders and media representatives."
"Fair elections are at the core of any democracy, and I am pleased to help bring international and domestic attention to the fairness of the Nigerian election process," said Carnahan in a statement.
Carnahan has been involved with the National Democratic Institute for more than 20 years, visiting seven countries to observe elections and offer training to political and civic leaders. Her staff notes, "After the fall of the Berlin Wall, Carnahan worked in Eastern Europe helping rebuild the region's democracies and economies by drafting voting laws, training new political leaders and monitoring elections."
Carnahan's fellow co-leader is Joe Clark, former prime minister of Canada; Mahamane Ousmane, former president of Niger; and Christopher Fomunyoh, the National Democratic Institute's senior associate and regional director for Central and West Africa. Election observers play an important role not only in focusing attention on Election Day but also on helping voters and local observers assess the overall fairness of the election and its results.
More from today's release:
"The National Democratic Institute has organized more than 150 international delegations to observe elections, pre-election environments and post-election developments. NDI led in developing the Declaration of Principles for International Election Observation and the Code of Conduct for International Election Observers, which was launched in October 2005 at the United Nations. Those standards have been endorsed by 36 intergovernmental and international nongovernmental organizations, which are engaged in promoting democracy and free and fair elections."
