Formation 2010 | Website www.eces.eu | |
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Headquarters 209A Avenue Louise, Brussels Belgium Board of directors Monica Fassoni, Fabio Bargiacchi, Eva Palmans, Andebrhan Giorgis, Lino Francescon, Paulo Marques Key people Monica Frassoni, President
Fabio Bargiacchi, Director | ||
The European Centre for Electoral Support (ECES) is a not for profit private foundation, headquartered in Brussels (Belgium) and created in 2010.
Contents
- History
- Mission
- Key activities
- Le Projet dAppui la Crdibilit et la Transparence des Elections au Burkina Faso PACTE BF
- Le Programme dAppui la Crdibilit et la Transparence des Elections en Guine PACTE GUINEE
- Le Projet dAppui la Crdibilit et la Transparence des Elections au Madagascar PACTE MADAGASCAR
- Le Projet dAppui la Crdibilit et la Transparence du processus lectoral au Comores PACTE COMORES
- Preventing Electoral Violence in the SADC Region PEV SADC
- Funding
- References
ECES aims to promote sustainable democratic development through advisory services and operational support to electoral stakeholders, such as electoral management bodies, civil society organizations (active in the field of civic and voter education and election observation), political parties, parliaments, media, security forces and electoral dispute resolutions bodies.
Since its creation, ECES has implemented activities in around 35 countries predominantly in Africa and the Middle East, mostly through the funds of the EU and EU member states .
ECES’ President is Monica Frassoni, a former Member of the EU Parliament, presently the Co-Chair of the European Green Party and twice Chief Observer for the EU Election Observation Missions (Venezuela and Bolivia, both in 2006) appointed by the former EU Commissioner for External Relations, Ferrero-Waldner.
ECES holds the vice-presidency of the European Partnership for Democracy (EPD), an important European network working on democracy assistance which is composed of 14 European not for profit organisations from 12 EU Member States.
ECES and EPD are implementing projects following a joint strategy entitled “European Response to Electoral Cycle Support-EURECS” in line with the EU Action Plan on Human Rights and Democracy 2015-2019, and the call of the EU to “strengthen long-term planning and integrated deployment of all aspects of EU and Member State support to the electoral cycle, by exploring innovative aid delivery mechanisms”.
History
The European Centre for Electoral Support (ECES) was launched in December 2010 during the European Development Days forum at the Panel on Democracy and Human Rights organized by the European Commission. Since then, ECES implemented electoral assistance activities in a large number of African and Middle Eastern countries
Mission
ECES’ work focuses on:
ECES is also a member of the European Partnership for Democracy and, within the framework of this network, ECES and EPD developed the European Response for Electoral Cycle Support, a strategy for the implementation of the EU’s democracy and electoral assistance by European non-profits organisations. Combined, the members of EPD implemented over 200 projects in around 130 countries in the last five years.
The strategy was presented, in June 2016, at the European Development Days (EDD 2016). ECES participated with the European Partnership for Democracy and they released the lessons learned from supporting democratic and electoral processes over the previous five years. ECES also participated in the high-level panel “Implementing Sustainable Development Goal 16 for peaceful and inclusive societies - Opportunities and challenges in the security and development nexus”, chaired by the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs & Security Policy/Vice-President of the European Commission (HRVP), Federica Mogherini. The panel was also composed of: the newly elected presidents of the Central African Republic (CAR), Faustin-Archange Touadéra, and Burkina Faso, Roch Marc Christian Kaboré and youth activist Marouane Bakin, founders of «Makers of Hope for Human Rights». ECES was represented by Thijs Berman, former member of the European Parliament and head of ECES’ EU funded project in the Central African Republic.
Key activities
ECES, following the EURECS approach, implements a range of activities for electoral stakeholders.
Le Projet d'Appui à la Crédibilité et à la Transparence des Elections au Burkina-Faso (PACTE-BF)
The multi-donor project, structured as a basket fund, in Support of the Credibility and the Transparency of Elections in Burkina Faso (PACTE-BF) was conceived to provide technical and operational support to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). The project, implemented by ECES in partnership with Osservatorio di Pavia, was designed to support the INEC in the implementation of its mission and, more precisely, in the organisation of presidential and legislative elections of 2015 and local election of 2016.
Le Programme d'Appui à la Crédibilité et à la Transparence des Elections en Guinée (PACTE-GUINEE)
ECES began its activities in Guinea in 2014 with a project aimed at strengthening of the Capacities of the National Assembly (PARCAN I). Since then, ECES remains very active in supporting the national democratic consolidation and implemented, in addition of the extension of the parliamentary support project (PARCAN II) in 2015, two programmes in support of the Credibility and the Transparency of Elections in Guinea Conakry (PACTE GUINNE I and II) in 2015 and 2016. These programmes, funded by the EU, aim at strengthening the capacities of electoral stakeholders by supporting newly installed democratic institutions, media, civil society and contributing to reduce potential conflicts by strengthening electoral disputes management.
Le Projet d'Appui à la Crédibilité et à la Transparence des Elections au Madagascar (PACTE-MADAGASCAR)
In 2013-2014, the Project in Support of the Credibility and the Transparency of the Electoral Process in Madagascar funded by the EU, was designed to foster a more professional, impartial and systematic management of the national electoral process, through the strengthening of the capacity of local electoral stakeholders, such as civil society organizations, media, political parties, electoral candidates, lawyers and the CENIT (Independent National Electoral Commission for the Transition).
Le Projet d'Appui à la Crédibilité et à la Transparence du processus électoral au Comores (PACTE-COMORES)
Within the framework of EU support to democratic processes, ECES implemented its first EU-funded project in Comoros in 2014. The project aimed at contributing to the organisation of credible and transparent elections while strengthening the capacities of the electoral stakeholders (PACTE Comoros I). PACTE Comores I thus contributed to the orgnisation of the 2015 legislative elections and elections for island counsellors. Based on this first successful collaboration in assistance to the Comorian electoral administration and other electoral stakeholders, a new project supporting the organization of the 2016 presidential and governors’ elections has been implemented. This project aims to follow-up on the endeavors of PACTE-Comoros I, while capitalizing on the recommendations of election observation missions (2015), as well as on the conclusions of the external evaluation of the previous project.
Preventing Electoral Violence in the SADC Region (PEV-SADC).
The overall objective of the project “Preventing Electoral Violence in the SADC - PEV-SADC” is to support key players, like civil society organisations across the Southern Africa Development Community-SADC (through SADC-Electoral Support Network), in preventing electoral related violence and conflict. PEV-SADC started in 2013 and has 3 components, a comprehensive capacity assessment, a development scheme for civil society, electoral management bodies and other stakeholders involved in the electoral process, and a research component that is meant to harvest first hand data on election related violence and conflict that in turn will be fed into an observatory.
Funding
The EU and its Member States are the largest donors of ECES by far, however ECES has been funded and collaborated with more than 20 donors.