A three-day workshop called ‘Building Resources in Democracy, Governance and Elections’ (BRIDGE)for political parties was underway from yesterday and will close tomorrow.

The BRIDGE module, focused on ‘Polling, Counting and Results,’ is being delivered by the Fijian Electoral Education Centre [FEEC], the Fijian Elections Office’s (FEO) education and capacity building arm.

The workshop has been organised in line with FEO’s Strategic Plan (2015 – 2019) Goal 8, which is to enhance the knowledge and skills of the FEO’s stakeholders through training and capacity building.

The workshop also delivers on the need for political party agent training for the 2018 General Election, as highlighted by the Multinational Observer Group (MOG).

“The BRIDGE workshop has been adopted by the FEO because it allows a very thorough discussions of issues,” said the Supervisor of Elections, Mohammed Saneem, at the official opening.

Twenty participants are attending the three-day workshop, including 12 registered political party representatives and eight interested individuals, who were selected from an ‘Expression of Interest’ process.

The lead facilitator for the workshop is Brian Latham who has 14 years of experience in delivering BRIDGE training. He is assisted by Yvonne Goudie, who also comes with vast experience in BRIDGE, being the curriculum co-ordinator and lead writer/expert facilitator from 2002 to 2008.

Two co-facilitators, Asenaca Kolinivala, manager FEEC and Ana Mataiciwa, legal compliance co-ordinatior at the FEO, are both fully accredited BRIDGE facilitator.

“It is very encouraging to have received over 60 expressions of interest frommembers of the public. The interest in election capacity building is surely growing,” Mr Mohammed Saneem. said.

 Source: Fijian Elections Office

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