The Southern African Development Community (SADC) will send a monitoring mission to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to ensure the presidential election's compliance with democratic procedures, SADC Executive Secretary Dr. Stergomena Lawrence Tax told Sputnik.
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 26th October, 2018) The Southern African Development Community (SADC) will send a monitoring mission to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to ensure the presidential election's compliance with democratic procedures, SADC Executive Secretary Dr. Stergomena Lawrence Tax told Sputnik.
"We are going to send a SADC observation mission [to DRC]. The elections are going to take place December 23, so that is how we support [them]. The SADC observation mission will be deployed across the country and the intention is to observe to ensure that the democratic principles are complied with ... to ensure that these are free and fair elections," Tax said.
She added that SADC had already been assisting the DRC, which is a member of the organization, by supporting the country's election commission on capacity-related and technical issues.
"We have a long term [observation mission], and a short term one. Now the one which is going to be stationed there to observe the election will be deployed in December," Tax stated.
The presidential election in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is currently scheduled for December 23. The country has been led by President Joseph Kabila since 2001. The president's second term expired in 2016, however, the authorities had been putting off the presidential election since then.
