Special Elections Report: Voter Education
Highlights
The Civic Coalition for Free Elections, a non-partisan movement of 76 organizations from across Iraq, produced television advertisements, hosted candidate debates, and facilitated town meetings encouraging Iraqis to go to the polls.
Media and Public Awareness Campaign
The Civic Coalition for Free Elections (CCFE), a non-partisan movement of 76 civic organizations from across Iraq, was established with the assistance of a USAID implementing partner to support Iraqi civil society organizations in designing and implementing country-wide domestic voter education campaigns.
Fifteen television messages were produced and aired by the CCFE on Iraqi television channels and numerous regional broadcast stations in Sunni areas on Election Day. One message featured a Sunni cleric calling on people to vote peacefully on Election Day; another featured a Shia cleric expressing the same faith and hope in democracy. Members of an Iraqi women's coalition are featured in another message reminding viewers that every person over age 18 can vote, not just the male head of each household.
CCFE hosted four 30-minute debates between candidates for Iraq's Transitional National Assembly, and aired each segment twice on television in the days leading up to the election. As part of a grass-roots "Get-Out-The-Vote" campaign, USAID's implementing partner produced more than two million posters and two million voter education booklets. Town hall meetings and conferences were also organized by the CCFE to encourage participation in the January elections. Finally, a humanitarian organization affiliated with the CCFE distributed 40,000 packages of aid that included voter education material to families in and around Fallujah.
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