Election workshops prepare officers

 ASSISTANT returning officers in East and West New Britain attended a workshop in Kokopo on how to conduct elections in their ward councils last week.

There are 13 officers from WNB and 18 from ENB. 

According to workshop facilitator Alwyn Jimmy, the election manager for New Ireland, it was the Electoral Commission’s responsibility to train election officers on how to conduct elections in their areas.

He said the country would be electing 6,129 ward councillors and 313 presidents in the local level government elections starting next month.

“The objective is to train them on how to conduct nominations,” Jimmy said

“We must know the law of nominations, how to get nominations, where to get nominations and areas candidates should  go to, to be nominated.

“The officers are also trained on how to conduct polling so they can teach officers in their communities, how to conduct counting and afterwards how to declare elections.

“They must understand that when polling is completed in all wards, they must immediately go into counting.”

Jimmy said the workshop for New Ireland and Manus would be conducted in Kavieng to have officers prepared so they would be able to train locals.