The Electoral Commissions Forum of SADC Countries (ECF-SADC) deployed a Pre-Election Assessment Mission to the Republic of Botswana from the 12 to 16 August 2024.The ECF -SADC is a regional umbrella organization for electoral management bodies in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region. It is a legal entity that is constituted of Electoral Commissions of Member States of the SADC region. Since its inception, the ECF SADC has played an important role and contributed to improving the quality of elections’ management and building the capacity of election management bodies in the SADC region

The primary purpose of the mission was to technically assess the preparedness of the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) of Botswana to hold free, fair and credible elections in October 2024 and ascertain the extent to which the 2019 recommendations by the ECF-SADC Observer Mission have been considered. In line with the Principles for Election Management, Monitoring and Observation (PEMMO) in the SADC region, pre assessment missions are deployed to the host country ahead of the elections to ascertain whether preconditions exist for the organization to dispatch an observer mission.

The pre-assessment mission was led by Chairperson at the Independent National Electoral Commission of Tanzania. Other participating member commissions were the Electoral Commission of South Africa, the Independent National Electoral Commission of Democratic Republic of Congo (CENI-DRC). The Mission was supported and coordinated by members of the ECF-SADC Secretariat based in Gaborone, Botswana.

The Mission met with some of the key electoral stakeholders to get perspectives on key issues and the context in which the 2024 General elections of the Republic of Botswana are taking place and to establish their collaboration with IEC Botswana. The Mission notes that there are also key stakeholders that were not met by the pre assessment mission but will be met by the main mission to in October 2024. These include political parties, relevant Government departments  to mention but a few.