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CEC to soon select a new executive director
The Commonwealth Election Commission board will be meeting soon to discuss, among other topics, the selection of the commission’s next executive director.
Acting CEC executive director Kayla Igitol said in an interview last week said there may be a meeting by the end of the month and one of the items on the agenda is the executive director’s position that was left vacant after the retirement of Julita A. Villagomez, who retired last Dec. 30 after working at CEC for 32 years. Igitol has been the acting executive director since Villagomez’s retirement.
Other issues to be discussed at the upcoming meeting are the CNMI’s election laws that the commissioners want to look at if there’s a need for changes or updating.
At present, the CEC has seven commissioners and that there is one vacant for Saipan and one for Tinian.
On the executive director’s position, Igitol said if the board offers it to her, she will accept it. “That’s really the discretion of the board if they want to make me permanent as executive director,” she said.
Igitol, who has been working with CEC for 13 years now, rose from the ranks. She started as a temporary employee for six months, then got extended and became an election register clerk. She then became an administrative officer.
Igitol said she and Villagomez worked together for 13 years and that she was a good co-worker and a good boss. “I enjoyed my time working with her. She trained me. I learned a lot from her,” she said, adding that Villagomez was the most senior at CEC when she joined the agency.
Igitol said Villagomez was the acting executive director at the time because then-executive director Gregorio Kilili C. Sablan had resigned to run as delegate.
