Stakeholders plan for ‘smooth’ elections

POLICE Commissioner David Manning says collaborative efforts between key stakeholders will see the successful running of the 2022 National Elections.
The need for collaborative efforts was highlighted as crucial to ensure a free and safe election in a meeting yesterday between all State agencies.
Police Commissioner David Manning told The National that the constabulary had been hard at work reviewing the 2012 and 2017 national elections.
“We spent the last few months reviewing 2012 and 2017 elections (to identify and assess what was done correctly), what went wrong and areas we could improve on,” he said.
“This is the start of an enhanced collaboration between all the necessary stakeholders.
“(We are) basically resetting the guidelines on how the operation should be planned and the clear lines of reporting and demarcation of responsibilities.”
Comm Manning said the experiences from the last two elections had taught them to be well- prepared.
He said going into elections with all stakeholders would make way for a much smoother process.
He said the Covid-19 pandemic was a new challenge that would add to the difficulty of managing the elections from a health and safety perspective.
Comm Manning said if cases continued to rise, they would review how the 2022 elections would be delivered.