Statement by the Supervisor of Elections

Mr Mohammed Saneem

FEO Announces One Day Forum on Voter Engagement and Participation

Venue: FEO Media Centre

Date: 07/03/22

Time: 3pm

Bula Vinaka Ladies and Gentlemen.

Warm greetings and welcome to this Press Conference.

Ladies and Gentlemen, as you are aware, the Fijian Elections Office [FEO] is currently conducting the nationwide ‘Know Your Election’ Campaign. As part of this campaign, the FEO is intending to hold a multi-stakeholder forum designed to brainstorm and develop strategies on ‘Enhancing Voter Participation’ in the 2022 General Election.

The 2018 General Election had seen a drop in turnout from 84% in 2014 down to 72% in 2018. This drop in the turnout is a reason for concern and as such during this nationwide campaign, it is ideal to look at best practices and options to create greater participation in the election.

Ladies and Gentlemen, following the 2018 General Election, the FEO scanned the voter lists for the entire country and prepared reports using the Voter registration data from this scanning exercise.

This report provides immense insights into the turnout trends by age, gender as well as individual localities around Fiji.  Using this turnout report, the FEO then carried out the post-election survey to investigate voter behaviour and perceptions in 2018.

For the first time, such reports were commissioned in Fiji. Both reports were tabled in Parliament as well.

This year, prior to the Know Your Election campaign, we carried out another pre-election survey. This survey provided even greater insights into the current voter perceptions and understanding of the electoral processes. This report will be available in due course.

Ladies and Gentlemen, the Fijian Elections Office has then as part of our plan decided to hold a 1-day stakeholder forum comprising of 3 to 4 brainstorming sessions depending panel size and numbers.

Our intended guests are political party representatives, Civil Society Organizations[CSO’s], media, voters, academia and as well as other agencies and partners of the FEO.

At the moment, we are looking at upto 50 participants in this stakeholder forum and to ensure that there is access for members of the general public to participate in this forum and give their own input, we have opened up positions for members of the public to apply. For interested individuals, they can apply to be part of   this critical forum, all you have to do is send us your Expression of Interest by email on the email address that we will provide in our advertisements.

The participation of members of the public will provide a greater input on the ground level anticipation towards the Election, as well provide the other stakeholders present there to remap their strategies in meeting the members of the general public.

Ladies and Gentlemen, the event is going to take place on 30 March 2022 and the Expression of Interest will be put out from today and will be closing on 18 March 2022.

Please feel free to apply and I look forward to your participation in this critical forum.

Thank You and Vinaka Vakalevu.