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MONROVIA - After a generation of civil war and instability, Liberia's citizens flocked to the polls Oct. 11, 2005, to vote in what could be the first genuine democratic elections in Liberia in almost two decades. The ballot included 22 presidential candidates and hundreds of contestants for the 94 seats in Liberia's Senate and House of Representatives.

A multinational delegation from The Carter Center and the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (NDI), co-led by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter and former President of Benin, Nicephore Soglo, was deployed in teams to different sites in 11 counties across the country Oct. 10. The 38-member delegation includes elected officials, electoral and human rights experts, regional specialists and political and civic leaders from 13 countries in North America, Europe and Africa.

The day before the elections, each team met with local election officials, party representatives, civic groups and others to assess the election environment at their deployment sites. On election day, the teams visited polling places and will remain to observe counting centers in their respective counties. They will reassemble in Monrovia for debriefing and to prepare a preliminary delegation statement, which will be released on Thursday, Oct. 13. The delegation will also monitor developments in the immediate postelection period.

The purposes of the delegation are: to express the international community's interest in and support for the development of democratic governance in Liberia, in particular for the organization of a democratic election process; and to provide an impartial and accurate report on that process to the Liberian people and the international community. These polls offer the people of Liberia an opportunity to further overcome a history of civil conflict and authoritarian rule. The establishment of democratic governance offers the best hope, and a difficult challenge, for attaining sustained peace and development in Liberia.

In preparation for election day, the delegation drew upon the findings of the ongoing joint election observation mission of NDI and The Carter Center. NDI and The Carter Center organized a pre-election delegation in early September and have maintained a continuous election monitoring presence in-country through resident staff and long-term observers.

The Carter Center, involved in the West African country's peace and democracy efforts since 1991, has actively engaged in the 2005 electoral process in Liberia (read more).