Meetings & Events

2006 AAEA Executive Board Meeting

TAIPEI, TAIWAN 26-29 September 2006

Meeting Agenda
Photo Gallery

LIST OF PARTICIPANTS


Venue:	Resident II, Grand Hyatt Taipei

Chair: (Taiwan)	Mr. Masa Chang, Chairman, Central Election Commission, Taiwan

Attended by:
(India)	Mr. Rajarshi Bhattacharya, Deputy Election Commissioner, Election Commission of India
	Mr. Rajesh Aggarwal, Director-Cum-Principal Secretary, Election Commission of India
(Indonesia)	Dr. Chusnul Mar’Iyah, Commissioner, Election Commission of Indonesia
	Dr. Vanila Ramlan Surbakti, Commissioner, Election Commission of Indonesia
(Sri Lanka)	Mr. Dayananda Dissanayake, Commissioner of Elections, Department of Elections, Sri Lanka
(Tajikistan)	Mr. Mizrob Kobirov, Deputy Chairman, Central Elections and Referendum Commission ,Tajikistan

Guest participants:
	General Ayub Assil, Deputy Chairman, Independent Election Commission, Afghanistan
	Ms. Momina Yari, Commissioner, Independent Election Commission, Afghanistan
	Mr. Peter Williams, Country Director, International Foundation for Election System
Secretariat:
	Ms. Mei-Chu Lin, AAEA Executive Secretary
	Mrs. Teresita Dy-Liacco Flores, AAEA Senior Consultant
	Mr. Ming-Hsien Yu, Director, AAEA Secretariat
	Ms. Yvonne Chen, Mr. Lawrence Wang,
	Mr. Kevin Tu, and Mr. Tzung-yu Lai

The 2006 Executive Board Meeting Participants

INTRODUCTION

2006 Executive Board Meeting was held at Grand Hyatt Taipei from 26 to 29 September. A total of five (5) executive board member election authorities agreed to send participants. Aside from CEC of Taiwan, the others were the Election Commission of India, the Indonesian Electoral Commission, Department of Elections of Sri Lanka and the Central Elections and Referendum Commission of Tajikistan.

The participants also met at the office of CEC to have a seminar for sharing electoral experiences in the afternoon. The topics covered the decision of choosing an election day, the arrangement of polling time and the use of electronic voting machine in India. Afghanistan delegates also made a PowerPoint presentation to introduce the electoral system of Afghanistan.

CALL TO ORDER

Chairman Chang of AAEA called the meeting to order at 10:00 am. He opened the meeting by introducing participants to AAEA Executive Board Meeting in Taipei. He also thanked the Board members for attending the meeting and finalized the agenda.

Mr. Masa Chang (R) Mrs. Mei-Chu Lin (C)

and Mrs. Teresita Dy-Liacco Flores (R)

SECRETARIAT REPORT

1 Financial Report for the period from June 2005 to September 2006

Resolved - that

1. The financial report of AAEA is approved.

2. AAEA members are encouraged to remit annual membership due.

Mrs. Mei-Chu Lin (L)

and Mrs. Teresita Dy-Liacco Flores (R)

Mr. Rajarshi Bhattacharya (R)

and Mr. Rajesh Aggarwal (L)

2 AAEA Official Website Report

The construction of AAEA’s official website is complete. As the domain name “aaea.org” is registered and used by the American Agricultural Economics Association, the secretariat registered AAEA’s domain name as “aaeasec.org” to set up AAEA official website. Web users can type http://www.aaeasec.org to access to AAEA’s website.

Resolved - that AAEA official website www.aaeasec.org is notified. AAEA members are welcomed to provide general information regarding their electoral systems to keep AAEA website updated.

Mr. Dayananda Dissanayake

3 AAEA Observation Mission on 2005 Sri Lanka Presidential Election

Sri Lanka conducted its fifth presidential election on November 17, 2005. AAEA was invited by Commissioner of Elections Dissanayake to send an election observation team. Mr. Masa Chang, AAEA Chairman, was unable to head the mission. In his stead, he recommended Mr. Benjamin S. Abalos, Chairman of the Commission on Elections of the Philippines and former AAEA Chairman to head the mission, and Ms. Mei-Chu Lin, Secretary General of the Taiwan CEC and AAEA Executive Secretary, to be the deputy head of the mission. Accompanying Mr. Abalos and Ms. Lin were delegates from Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Mongolia, Papua New Guinea, Pakistan, the Philippines, Taiwan, and Tajikistan. On the last day of the election observation, AAEA mission submitted a report to Commissioner of Elections Dissanayake. AAEA Secretariat produced extra copies of the report and sent it to each AAEA member this January.

AAEA Press Conference in Sri Lanka

Resolved – that

1. AAEA observation mission on 2005 Sri Lanka presidential election report is notified.

2. On behalf of the Association of Asian Election Authorities Election, Chairman Chang extended his deepest appreciation to the Commissioner of Elections, Mr. Dayananda Dissanayake for his hospitalities and for his unstinting cooperation with the Mission.

PARTICULAR ISSUES TO BE CONSIDERED AT THE MEETING

1 Adaptation of AAEA Flag in rays of new members

AAEA flag was designed by the Philippine COMELEC, the former AAEA Secretariat. It was first raised at the opening ceremony of the 2005 General Assembly.

According to the 2005 General Assembly report explaining AAEA flag design, electric blue was used as the background to represent fair and honest elections and a sun at the middle with fourteen rays of canary yellow color to represent the fourteen members. However, as the number of AAEA members might increase, AAEA flag might need to be changed. AAEA secretariat suggests either

(A) to adjust the explanation of AAEA flag design; or

(B) to reduce the number of rays from fourteen to eight in consideration of the eight members.

Some examples:

Resolved – that suggestions regarding flag modifications will be collected by the secretariat and submitted to the general assembly.

The meeting in process

2 Decision where and when to hold 2007 Executive Board Meeting.

Please decide the host country and date of the 2007 Executive Board Meeting.

Resolved – that Indonesia will be the host country of 2007 Executive Board Meeting, and the meeting date will be decided when Indonesia commission reaches the decision.

Dr.Vanila Ramlan Surbakti (L)

and Dr. Chusnul Mar’Iyah (R)

3 Discussion on Membership applications from the Independent Election Commission (IEC) of Afghanistan and the Election Committee of Bhutan

On 22 June and on 19 July, Chairman Bismil of the Independent Election Commission (IEC) of Afghanistan and Chief Election Commissioner Wangdi of the Election Commission of Bhutan sent their statements to the secretariat to apply for AAEA membership. The secretariat, as per AAEA Charter stipulations, submitted their applications during this meeting. According to AAEA Charter, a recommendation will be made by the executive board to be circulated among AAEA members. The General Assembly will vote on whether to accept the applications.

From Left to Right: Mr. Masa Chang,

Mr. Peter Williams, General Ayub Assil,

Ms. Momina Yaris, and Mrs. Mei-Chu Lin

Resolved – that

1. Membership application of IEC Afghanistan is approved unanimously and it will be submitted further to the general assembly to endorse this decision by a majority vote. The board also agreed that the Independent Election Commission (IEC) of Afghanistan is invited as observers to participate in the general assembly of AAEA and other activities of the association before the assembly approves their membership application.

2. Membership application of the Election Commission of Bhutan is accepted and their application will also be submitted to the assembly. The Election Committee of Bhutan will be invited as observers to participate in the general assembly of AAEA and other activities of the association.

ADJOURNMENT

There being no new business, the board meeting was adjourned at 12:15.