July 10th, 2007
The elections are over!!! They went well and the results are final. No one was able to achieve a clear majority, which will mean several of the parties will try to form an alliance to give them majority. The remainder of our time here in East Timor will be the delivery of a civic education program to explain to the voters what the new parliament will look like and how it will work. My plans are now that I will be leaving East Timor on July 31st! While I am very excited to be returning home, I have had a lot of fun as well as learning a lot during my time in East Timor.
Some of the highlights really happened in the last two months with my move to the Covalima district. Two weeks prior to the election we had extreme rainfall. The flash flooding that occurred over 3 days destroyed 5 bridges, completely cutting Suai from the rest of East Timor. These were not small bridges but large ones built by the Indonesians. After a few days it may have been possible to cross the rivers on foot, if it hadn’t been for the Crocs swimming in the river. The rains flooded many homes and the crocs were actually able to swim to the houses and were stealing small animals like goats and chickens at night.
This certainly made Election Day a lot more exciting but with lots of air support, all the materials were delivered and retrieved on time. Some of the other highlights were seeing a 6.5 meter python, seeing a lot of very large crocs, many good barbeques at the Australian Special Forces camp, and loads of great weather!
The UNMIT mission here is not completely winding down. UNPOL will remain and integrate with the National Police Force to assist the government with training. A small team of electoral will also remain to continue working with the nationals with final wrap up of the election as well as numerous others working in areas of judicial system and human rights monitoring.
But for me, I am looking forward to getting home and enjoying some Island Summer!! See you all soon!
The elections are over!!! They went well and the results are final. No one was able to achieve a clear majority, which will mean several of the parties will try to form an alliance to give them majority. The remainder of our time here in East Timor will be the delivery of a civic education program to explain to the voters what the new parliament will look like and how it will work. My plans are now that I will be leaving East Timor on July 31st! While I am very excited to be returning home, I have had a lot of fun as well as learning a lot during my time in East Timor.
Some of the highlights really happened in the last two months with my move to the Covalima district. Two weeks prior to the election we had extreme rainfall. The flash flooding that occurred over 3 days destroyed 5 bridges, completely cutting Suai from the rest of East Timor. These were not small bridges but large ones built by the Indonesians. After a few days it may have been possible to cross the rivers on foot, if it hadn’t been for the Crocs swimming in the river. The rains flooded many homes and the crocs were actually able to swim to the houses and were stealing small animals like goats and chickens at night.
This certainly made Election Day a lot more exciting but with lots of air support, all the materials were delivered and retrieved on time. Some of the other highlights were seeing a 6.5 meter python, seeing a lot of very large crocs, many good barbeques at the Australian Special Forces camp, and loads of great weather!
The UNMIT mission here is not completely winding down. UNPOL will remain and integrate with the National Police Force to assist the government with training. A small team of electoral will also remain to continue working with the nationals with final wrap up of the election as well as numerous others working in areas of judicial system and human rights monitoring.
But for me, I am looking forward to getting home and enjoying some Island Summer!! See you all soon!
