The Local Council Elections were delayed again on Friday while National Advisory Committee meetings over postponing it were ongoing, opposition parties said.

The Maldivian Democratic Party’s (MDP) Secretary-General, Anas Abdul Sattar, said after the committee meeting, held at the Elections Commission’s head office on Friday, that Elections Commissioner Ahmed Sulaiman had received a letter from the Health Protection Agency (HPA) asking for the postponement. 

Sattar expressed concern over EC's decision to announce the postponement, with a new date set, while the committee meeting was ongoing.

The HPA’s letter reportedly advises against holding any activity that would require larger groups of people to gather, with Sattar adding that the letter still does not advocate postponing the polls. 

Hussein Rasheed Hassan, deputy leader of the Jumhooree Party (JP), said the H1N1 outbreak is not severe enough to warrant the postponement. 

“Phase three is what the HPA announced, that does not mean we should delay the elections, this will further diminish the trust people have in the electoral process” Rasheed said. 

The Elections Commission announced the postponed, now to May 6th, in an urgent press conference on Friday, where Deputy Commissioner Amjad Musthafa cited the HPA’s letter – which he explicitly said had encouraged the decision.  

Musthafa said that the decision was made in the advisory committee, and that everyone present, except two, had agreed with it. 

The commission has again extended the re-registration period. 

This is the third postponement. 

Initially, the polls were scheduled for January 14th, and was delayed after the ruling Progressive Party of Maldives’s (PPM) faction led by President Abdulla Yameen pursued a case at the civil court on the grounds that they had lost their membership database, though the deadline to submit candidates was December 1st. 

The court had ruled in favour of the party and ordered that the elections be held on a date that allows PPM’s candidates adequate time to campaign and prepare for the ballots.  This verdict is in line with another clause in the

Local Council Elections Act which states that candidates must have a period of at least 28 days to contest the elections.

This resulted in the elections’ postponement to April 8th, however the commission delayed it further over the unavailability of schools to place ballot boxes in. It was then slated for April 15th.