Burkina Faso holds historic election on Sunday November 29, 2015 using new transparent ballot boxes from ESI.
New design, new colours, new format with an increased level of transparency. The Commission Electorale Nationale Indépendante (CENI) in Ouagadougou is now breathing a sigh of relief with elections behind them and out of the way. On the horizon of what will be a busy year, municipal elections will take place next. President Maitre Kere of the CENI employed a diligent team of local electoral workers, authorities and international experts who were focused on the task at hand. Elections were all the more challenging to organize with the attempted “Coup” still on everyone’s mind. In view of the obvious difficulties, the polling event still took place. Members of the CENI, local international electoral experts and suppliers are to be congratulated for this endeavor.
Ballot box innovator and electoral materials expert Electoral Services International Inc. (ESI)’s European Logistics Manager, Mr. Bart Gysel, remarked “These are very different specifications to our usual boxes but we will most certainly get the job done and, if anything, improves upon the original design”. The CENI required the lid be not opaque, but rather “transparent.” To challenge the production experts further, the secure door needed to be a different solid color and of a different material composition. The lid was fabricated with high quality polycarbonate (a plastic that is a lightweight, high-performance material that possesses a unique balance of strength, toughness and stability). It also has a high level of optical clarity and a high heat resistance. A high-quality transparent product for a major electoral event was just what the CENI required.
ESI produced and successfully delivered 28,000 of the newly designed ballot boxes. The size of the ballot box was 83 litres which was originally established by ESI when it produced a similar sized box for the first democratic elections in Iraq. The CENI opted for the larger size ballot box to accommodate a larger format of their secure ballot used in the November polls.
No matter the size and no matter the level of opacity, ESI can and will deliver.
ESI thanks the CENI (and all of its supporters) for their business and partnership. ESI has been assured by the CENI of its product quality, cost-effectiveness and timely delivery.