The Papua New Guinea (PNG) National Research Institute (NRI) have finally published key findings from their observations of the 2022 National General Election (NGE) in the Highlands Region and have concluded that the key issues have not changed from the previous election observation reports. According to the NRI, the issues are particularly around the matters with election administration and legal and integrity of the electoral process, such as the use of outdated common roll, block voting, double and multiple voting and also new trends, such as control and distributive voting by only few community leaders. Spotlight Vol. 16, Issue 17 by Research Fellow, Jeremy Goro, outlines that although many strives to make the Electoral Processes more transparent by many stakeholders including the Government, the issues remain the same. The PNGNRI, who is mandated to conduct applied social and economic research on a wide range of public policy issues, has been observing many elections and last year, the institute changed its observation approach to ethnographical by recruiting local observers to observe elections in six open electorates in the Highlands Region, including one Provincial Seat. According to Goro’s observation, there were new trends of voting observed in the 2022 NGE compared to the previous common voting practices reported in the previous election observation by the NRI of the 2007 NGE (May et al., 2011), Transparency International PNG (TIPNG, 2022) and Australia National University (ANU, 2018) reports. The common issues of polling in the Highlands of PNG reported by such studies included common roll, double and multiple voting, under-age voting and the ‘Tanim Box’ voting. These reports also highlighted unfair distribution of ballot papers where certain council wards got more ballot papers than the number of eligible voters while others got less ballot papers than the number of eligible voters. In 2022, the PNG NRI observation teams all reported the similar patterns of voting right across the Highlands Region. • Common Roll issues continue to be the most disappointing part of polling when voters did not find their names on the Common Roll (Defective Roll). As a result of the defective common roll, community leaders took control of the voting. • Control, block and distributive voting was seen as a strategy for convenience and to settle tensions (cooperative voting). A few people marked ballot papers on behalf of everyone. • Compromising of voting materials where the allocated with serial numbers ballot papers for specified polling locations were not delivered to those locations. • Lack of security for polling officials: Most polling places lacked security presence and officials had to flee for their safety when voters controlled polling, leaving the people to mark the ballot papers in their absence. The absence of security forces led to coercion, threats and intimidation. Due to these reasons, here are some recommendations proposed by the PNGNRI; • Election planning and logistics must be prepared in advance and implemented accordingly without late changes. • A new way of Common Roll Update needs to be introduced by integrating Ward Record System with National NID Project to be rolled out at the ward level and verified by Village Court Officials, Councilors and pastors with penalty for default, in order to ensure integrity of the Common Roll. • Voting must be free, fair and safe, where every eligible voter must be allowed to vote freely, fairly and safely in the secret booths to ensure that the outcome of the election is legitimate and credible. • Security operations must start with the campaign and end with the declaration. It must be more effective and efficient. This should be considered for future elections. • Need for at least three to five Electoral Commissioners through a change in the law, so that decisions are made by the Chief Electoral Commissioner with the Commissioners, which will be more informed than having one person make the decisions.