The Elections Commission’s decision to delay the local council elections, now slated for May 6th, is a display of the commission’s lack of civility, former Vice President Mohamed Jameel Ahmed said.
The commission had announced its decision on Friday night, citing the ongoing H1N1 outbreak.
In a tweet on Saturday, Jameel – now the leader of the Maldives United Opposition (MUO), the opposition coalition – said that the government’s influence on the commission would reflect ‘bitterly’ in the ballots.
“There is no point in President Yameen raising his voice against the opposition today, he is just fearful of the elections” another tweet said.
Jameel was impeached through a no-confidence vote in parliament, widely believed to have been orchestrated to allow Ahmed Adheeb to become his successor – who was later impeached as well, and tried on terror charges.
Jameel, with his passport revoked since September 2016 for having left the country ahead of the vote, has been living in the United Kingdom since.
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.
