The National Democratic Institute is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization working to support and strengthen democratic institutions worldwide through citizen participation, openness and accountability in government.

In November 2011, the Democratic Republic of Congo is scheduled to hold multiparty elections for only the second time in five decades. The Reverend Daniel Mulunda-Nyanga, chairman of the DRC’s Independent National Electoral Commission (CENI), faces a tight timeline, substantial logistical hurdles, and a crowded field of challengers to incumbent Joseph Kabila. At a recent event co-sponsored by NDI and the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Kabila provided an update on the CENI’s progress in organizing the vote, and outline the remaining challenges facing the commission in the months to come.

Barrie Freeman, NDI’s deputy regional director for Central and West Africa, also spoke at the event.

“Unlike the DRC’s transition elections of 2006, the 2011 electoral process is firmly in the hands of Congolese themselves,” Freeman said. “The role of the international community – and in particular the UN – is much lighter now, as these elections are expected to consolidate gains made during the past five years and further the DRC along the democratic path of its own choosing. If the 2006 elections marked the DRC’s break from the past, the 2011 elections are meant to show the way forward.”