Democracy Belongs to Us

At Partnerships for Integrity (P4I), we are working alongside courageous civic actors, reformers, and institutions to defend democratic systems and cultures and to strengthen integrity in some of the world’s most challenging environments. Across regions and sectors, our work focuses on supporting local leadership, strengthening accountability, and amplifying voices that are too often marginalized. Below are highlights from our most recent work.

New Partnerships and Networks

May has been another busy month for P4I. We are thrilled to announce five new partnership agreements with trusted local organizations across three regions, reflecting our commitment to grounding our work in local expertise and genuine collaboration. Our new partners are in Ukraine, Benin, Nigeria, Guinea, and Armenia. 

In Ukraine, we are privileged to work alongside Integrity.UA as the country progresses toward EU accession and its own goals of transparent and accountable governance. Our new partnerships with AfricTivistes CitizenLab (ACLB) (Benin), Kimpact Development Initiative (KDI) (Nigeria), Fondation Solidarité Feminine (Guinea), and Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly-Vanadzor (Armenia) extend our reach across West Africa and the South Caucasus, deepening our work at the nexus of elections, anti-corruption, and civic space.

P4I is also now a member of Nets4Dem, which is a “meta-network” creating a hub for collaboration and advanced research in the field of democratic innovation, civic deliberation, participation and citizenship education. Nets4Dem unites government, civil society and academia to strengthen our joint capacity to implement innovative democracy initiatives at local, national and European levels.

Moldova: Disability Rights and Inclusive Electoral Participation

Inclusive elections are about individual rights — but they also strengthen democracy for everybody. This month, P4I partnered with Infonet Alliance on a training session focused on the rights of persons with disabilities and inclusive participation in electoral processes in Moldova, led by P4I’s Meredith Applegate. The training addressed international human rights standards, including the provisions of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, emphasizing that political participation is a fundamental right of every person. Participants from disability advocacy organizations, civil society, and election administration explored practical ways in which electoral institutions can remove structural barriers to participation, civil society organizations can advocate for accessibility standards, and organizations of persons with disabilities can engage with election management bodies as partners rather than merely as beneficiaries. 

Caribbean: Launching the RAID Working Group

P4I is proud to support the launch of the Regional Accessible and Inclusive Democracy (RAID) Working Group in the Caribbean, a new initiative dedicated to advancing democracy for persons with disabilities across the CARICOM region. The RAID Working Group held its inaugural meeting on 24 April and its second meeting in late May, bringing together disability advocates and civil society leaders from Barbados, Dominica, Guyana, Jamaica, St Lucia, and beyond. Over the next six months, RAID will focus on strategic areas in the lead up to the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in November, including: accessible elections; climate change and disaster response; and artificial intelligence and technology. This is regional advocacy grounded in lived experience, driven by regional experts and the communities most affected. We are also incredibly lucky to be supported in this work by two P4I Strategic Advisors: Ganesh Singh and Lasanthi Daskon.

To inform the RAID Working Group’s work, we worked with these partners to conduct a survey of voters with disabilities across the Caribbean, reaching respondents from Barbados, Guyana, Jamaica, Grenada, Saint Kitts and Nevis, and Trinidad and Tobago. The findings are stark. Sixty percent of respondents rated their country’s electoral process as mostly or not accessible. Nearly half (44%) said they were unable to vote independently and in secret. The most commonly cited barrier was being unable to read and mark the ballot independently, reported by 42% of respondents. Thirty percent found entering the polling station challenging, and an equal share reported that poll workers were unaware of their accessibility requirements.

Behind these statistics are real experiences. One voter from Jamaica described having to bring someone to help mark their ballot, unable to exercise their vote privately. A wheelchair user in Saint Kitts and Nevis found the electoral office itself inaccessible before they could even register. A voter in Guyana reported that polling station staff treated their accessibility needs as an inconvenience. Too often, persons with disabilities are engaged as beneficiaries of democracy — not as equal participants in it. The RAID Working Group is here to advocate at the highest level to make real change.   

South Asia: Launching the Political Finance Community of Practice

P4I is proud to announce the launch of the South Asia Political Finance Community of Practice, bringing together four countries and six partners to tackle political finance challenges across the region. Partners include Accountability Lab Nepal, Youth in Federal Discourse (Nepal), the Sustainable Social Development Organization (Pakistan), the Institute for Democratic Reforms and Electoral Studies (Sri Lanka), the Bangladesh Institute of Peace and Security Studies, and P4I. This working group also benefits from the support and guidance of P4I Strategic Advisors Barbara Stonestreet and Lasanthi Daskon.

Money plays an essential role in electoral competition, enabling candidates to run campaigns and reach voters. But when funding sources are hidden and campaign spending is concealed or inadequately disclosed, political finance becomes a vehicle for undue influence and undermines public confidence in political institutions. Anti-corruption movements across South Asia have highlighted widespread public concern about governance and accountability, with explicit calls for greater political finance transparency to curb the influence of undisclosed money in electoral processes.

The timing of this Community of Practice is deliberate. The adoption of UNCAC Resolution 11/7 at the 2025 Conference of the States Parties marked an important step in advancing international standards on political finance transparency. The resolution aims to require states to publish real-time political finance reports online, close loopholes for illicit funding flows, equip oversight agencies, protect civic watchdogs, and prevent the abuse of state resources during elections. Now is the time to make these standards a reality for people on the ground across Asia.

At the inaugural meeting, partners shared practical insights on the state of political finance in their countries. Discussions covered recent legislative reforms and remaining loopholes in Sri Lanka and Nepal, the limited capacity of election management bodies to scrutinize party and candidate finance reports in Nepal and Pakistan, and the importance of digital disclosure tools and right-to-information mechanisms across the region. Partners also agreed on a collaborative research proposal: a comparative analysis of the digital disclosure of political finance data on election management body websites across Nepal, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka.

Regional Dialogue on Africa Treaty Body Case Law

P4I co-founder Typhaine Roblot was back in Nairobi alongside P4I Strategic Advisor Elizabeth Tanui to contribute to a practitioner dialogue on electoral justice organized by the Electoral Institute for Sustainable Democracy in Africa (EISA). The event convened human rights defenders, election practitioners, judges, and lawyers to review the first-ever manual on case law on elections by Africa treaty bodies. Experts from across the region discussed national and regional courts’ jurisprudence, recent trends in electoral litigation, and explored strategic litigation.

Guinea: Preparing for Elections and (Inevitable) Disputes

Elections took place in Guinea last month and P4I co-founder Typhaine Roblot, together with Strategic Advisor Mountaga Sylla and Global Expertise Guinea (GEG) were happy to support a two-day workshop with the Supreme Court of Guinea, focused on the effective management of electoral disputes ahead of the 31 May parliamentary elections. The Supreme Court convened 59 participants, including 49 magistrates, a chief registrar and nine registrars. Through case scenarios and comparative jurisprudence developed with GEG and P4I, participants engaged in dynamic exchanges on the new provisions of the 2025 electoral code and emerging challenges, including candidacy and campaign-related disputes, results challenges and adequate remedies, disinformation in elections and access to digital evidence collection or seat allocation formulas.

Accountability in Political Finance

Coming up

As a member of the Team Europe Democracy (TED) initiative, P4I co-founders will be heading to the TED annual event in Brussels from June 16-17 to connect with members and lead a session on Accountability for electoral manipulation and corruption: the role of the justice sector in protecting political and electoral rights. 

P4I’s Meredith Applegate will be contributing to the next meeting of the Community of Democracy’s Youth Democracy Network, discussing how elections don’t necessarily mean democracy and the engagement of youth movements in meaningful change.

P4I partner Think Big will be hosting a hackathon in Nepal in June in partnership with university students, encouraging people to design new ways to use technology to increase civic participation and challenging contestants to find new ways to bridge the digital divide.

P4I is presenting at the 43rd Cambridge International Symposium on Economic Crime from 23 to 30 August 2026, at Jesus College, Cambridge. Our amazing Strategic Advisor, Dr Ingrida Kerusauskaite has been a key driving force behind this premier anti-corruption convening for a number of years. 

Save the date(s) and join us at the #Disinfo2026 conference in Vilnius, 7-8 October, 2026, and the International Anti-Corruption Conference (IACC) in Punta Cana 1-4 December 2026. At Disinfo2026 we are organizing a panel on “accountability for digital interference in elections”, while at the IACC we are bringing prosecutors together to talk about “Political Corruption: The Delicate Role that Prosecutors and Judges must play” (in partnership with our Strategic Advisor, Laura Stefan of Expert Forum Romania.

Thank You for Standing with Us

At P4I, we remain committed to integrity, inclusion, and democratic courage, and we are deeply grateful to our partners and supporters who make this work possible. We are a registered charitable organization in Germany. Donations made in Germany are tax deductible and can be made via our website.

We also have cooperation agreements with registered non-profits that allow us to have tax-deductible donations in the United States and France. For US-tax deductible donations, we have an agreement with Myriad USA. Donations can be made via the instructions here, placing “Maecenata US Fund, TG25173 Partnerships for Integrity (P4I)” as the beneficiary in the method you choose; or you can donate via our every.org fundraiser here.

For France-tax deductible donations, we have a partnership with the Fondation de France; please contact us at info@p4iglobal.org to receive the instructions.

If you would like to make a tax-deductible donation and your country is not listed above, please reach out to us at info@p4iglobal.org.

Most importantly, your solidarity, your partnership, and your everyday actions to choose democracy remain essential to us and to everyone choosing democracy, accountability, peace, and community right now. Thank you.

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