Newtec Government & Defence Satellite Communication Seminar Bruxelles, October 23rd 2013

1. Burkina Faso
2012 elections
SES Broadband
Antonio Bove, Senior Manager, Products & Marketing
Government & Defence Satellite Communication Seminar - October 23rd 2013

2. Our vision
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and partners around the world to grow their
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around the world.

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satellite capacity, related platforms and
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broadcasters
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telcos
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and institutions
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6. Satellite fleet in 2015

7. Our product
 Always-on connectivity for broadband and
VoIP
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 Low-cost subscriber equipment
 Easy to install and use
 No infrastructure investment required
 Sustains large end-user populations
 Capable of large network deployments
 ‘Triple play’ capability – Internet, TV and VoIP
in one offering
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8. Burkina Faso elections
a nice story to say
SES Broadband

9. What was the situation before
To make a long story short
▲ Burkina Faso signed the African Charter on Democracy Elections and Governance in 2007 becoming one of the
few African countries to have completed the NEPAD African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM)
▲ Despite concrete actions to improve governance in the country, Burkina’s young generation and military personnel
rioted against the government in April 2011
▲ As a result, President Blaise Compaoré revisited his government and focused his attention on the young
generation, women and the improvement of democratic conditions
▲ In July 2011, the National Assembly dissolved the Independent National Electoral Commission (CENI) in order
to appoint a new chairman to lead CENI's preparations for the 2012 legislative and municipal elections. In the
process, Barthelemy Kere was elected as the new chairman. The newly elected team immediately began
preparations for 2012 elections in Burkina Faso
▲ The central goal of the National Commission was to ensure a more reliable voter registry for the elections
scheduled on December 2nd 2012
▲ To realize this scheme, the government decided to connect 45 provinces to Ouagadougou via satellite and thus
warrant quicker distribution of election results and interactive discussion with CENI representing responsible in the
provinces
▲ This was the first election held under the new CENI directorate, a transparent and exemplary election process was
vital – especially as it was the first vote since the spring 2011 crisis. A successful and fair election could then be
seen as a possible indication that the country’s political trajectory remains positive looking toward the next
presidential elections in 2015
▲ On December 2nd 2012, Burkina Faso elected a new government, assigning new seats in its 127-member
National Assembly Parliament as well as 18,584 municipal officials in the first concurrent ballots
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10. The strategic view
▲To achieve an institutionalization of
transparency, accountability and
participatory democracy
▲Use of a biometric system to prevent
vote manipulations
▲Satellite broadband and
videoconferencing to facilitate the
highest possible transparency and
dialog
▲Declare electoral results within a week
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11. Scope of the project
▲ Satellite-based solution allowing:
• Internet access with VoIP
• Simultaneous videoconferencing sessions from CENI to electoral district offices and
from one district to another
• Transmission of the electoral data (FTP uploads)
Partnership with local ICT companies was strategic to ensure fast and reliable
implementation
VSAT transmission
(CD, hard disk or paper)
Local polling station
(18,698)
CENI central site in Quagadogou
Data collection and processing
(1)
Electoral district office
(45)
Electoraldatagathering
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Comparatively small African country of 274,200
square kilometres

12. Technical Implementation
VSAT
▲ Bandwidth: 32 Mbit/s in Ku-band over ASTRA4A at 5° Est
▲ Hub located in Luxembourg
▲ Network
• Traffic was aggregated in Luxembourg and routed to the central site in Ouagadougou with
double hop (transmission delay ~ 1.2 à 1.5 sec)
• Mix of MDM 2200 (electoral district offices) and EL470 (CENI HQ)
Advantages:
• Record implementation time (<12 weeks) of the
end – to – end solution providing full coverage of
the country
• Fast, reliable and secure transmission of electoral
data
• Increased transparency through video-
conferencing and visio-surveillance applications
• Optimised processing and delivery time of the
results helping to reduce the socio-political
instability
Key facts & figures:
• 4,365,202 voters registered (75.3% participation rate)
• 18,698 polling stations spread across the country
• 100 technicians, 25,000 observers and over 90,000
collaborators
• 2,160 Gbyte of data and 1,000 hours of video
sessions managed by the network
• 250 connected PCs
• 14,400 hours in project management
• 98 people for technical support involved

13. Technical Implementation
Video Solution
▲ Electoral district offices configuration
• Polycom HDX6000: RealPresence Video Solutions
installed in each of 45 provincial office
- Camera EagleEye configured with 256 Kbit/s codec
- HDX Microphone
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 Video Platform at central site
• MCU (RMX 2000 ): Multimedia Platform
• RSS 4000: Centralised systems for the provisioning and
management of video streams
Polycom HDX 6000

14. Installation in central site
Ouagadougou
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15. Installation in remote site
Kongoussi

16. Implementation strategy
▲ SES is operating in the electoral domain since 2007 with
various initiatives aiming at building and transferring
knowledge among operators
▲ In June 2012 a workshop has been organized in
Luxembourg with representatives of the African National
Independent Electoral Committees (CENI)
▲ In June 2012 an ad-hoc workshop has been organized in
Luxembourg for requirements definition
▲ A contract was signed on October 2012 and the project was
kick started
▲ Network deployment took less than six weeks thanks to the
excellent cooperation between all parties
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17. Main challenges and lessons learned
▲ The project was a great success, all parties involved worked very hard to ensure the
delivery in due time, whereby everyone was infused by a common sense of
urgency
▲ Nonetheless, some obstacles did arise during the delivery and shall be considered
as important lessons learned for the future projects:
• Reliable and constant power supply was not always available. Due to power cuts and
spikes, some locations therefore suffered power outages during the election period, especially
during the installation, provisioning and testing phase, which is a very critical aspect of the
project
• Power generators have been made available to successfully minimized the impact of the
power shortages
• Selected locations were not optimized for the installation of the complex technology systems.
Usually, dust and extremely high temperatures were a prevailing and very dangerous hazard
for the sensitive computers, laptops and other high-tech device.
▲ The overall projects was deployed within 12 weeks and the major challenge was the
logistic component (in country shipping, import/export, regulatory and tax duties)
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18. Follow-on activities
▲ The main objectives of CENI and SES was not only to deliver a state of the art of
satellite technology at reasonable costs, but to ensure the economical
sustainability of the deployed system after the electoral process
▲ In order to ensure a sustainable follow-up of the initiative, the involved parties
decided to identify possible alternative use for the deployed system from the start
▲ The infrastructure will support ICT initiatives in the field of eLearning and
eGovernance
▲ Target applications: Internet access to schools, public offices and remote villages
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19. Thank you
Antonio Bove
antonio.bove@ses.com