Within the framework of the Memorandum of Understanding signed, in August 2015, between the European Centre for Electoral Support (ECES) and the Mexico City’s Electoral Institute (Instituto Electoral del Districto Federal, IEDF), the European Centre for Electoral Support has recently carried out 3 LEAD – Leadership and Conflict Management Trainings in Mexico City. These trainings have been organised jointly by the IEDF and the Electoral Prosecutor’s Office (Físcalia Especializada para la Atención a los Delitos Electorales, FEPADE).
The trainings were opened by a ceremony presided by both the IEDF and the FEPADE at the International Conference Centre in Mexico City on November 25th 2016. The IEDF was represented by Chairman Mario Velázquez and by Councillor Yuri Beltrán. Director General of Criminal Offences Policy Dorilita Mora and Director General of Trial Inquiries, Alvaro Rodríguez, represented the Electoral Prosecutor, Dr. Santiago Nieto. ECES was represented by its Senior Programmes Advisor and Electoral Expert, Vera Lourenço. Vera will be facilitating the trainings with ECES’ Senior Electoral Expert, Adolfo Cayuso. Both experts are LEAD accrediting facilitators and have implemented LEAD trainings in a number of countries.
The FEPADE and IEDF expressed their appreciation of their partnership with ECES and their interest in continuing to work with ECES in matters of capacity-building and exchange of expertise. Previous to the signature of the MoU in August 2015, Adolfo Cayuso participated in the IEDF’s visitor’s programme on behalf of ECES to observe the Federal District’s Elections, invited by the IEDF.
The 3 four-day trainings took place from November 25th to December 8th 2016, and capacitated representatives of the IEDF, the FEPADE, the National Electoral Institute (Instituto Nacional Electoral, INE), and the Electoral Tribunal (Tribunal Electoral del Poder Judicial de la Federación) in matters of leadership and conflict management. Each of the 3 trainings had participants of these different organisations and aimed not only to capacitate them in leadership and electoral conflict management, but also to establish links and create further understanding and coordination amongst these different institutions that are responsible for implementing elections in Mexico.
The LEAD training is one of ECES’ flagship trainings and has been carried out in over 40 countries, in English, French, Portuguese, Arabic, and Spanish. The innovative training aims to capacitate all electoral stakeholders to prevent, manage and mitigate election-related conflicts and violence. Developed in 2009, the training is customised to address the national and regional context of the country it is being carried in to. In this case, ECES’ experts and facilitators worked closely with representatives of both the IEDF and the FEPADE to establish the themes these two organisations believe may be of interest in the upcoming electoral cycles in Mexico.
