From: Berhane Habtemariam (Berhane.Habtemariam@gmx.de)
Date: Sun Nov 22 2009 - 15:44:42 EST
Sudan delays elections by six days
Sun Nov 22, 2009 7:16pm GMT
KHARTOUM, Nov 22 (Reuters) - Sudan on Sunday announced a six-day delay to
long-awaited elections to make up for hold-ups in registering millions of
voters in the oil-producing country.
Election officials have faced huge logistical challenges in rolling out the
first multi-party polls in 24 years in Sudan, Africa's largest country.
Sudan's National Elections Commission said it was extending voter
registration across the country by seven days to Dec. 7 because of a late
start in some areas and appeals for an extension from some political
parties.
As a result, the start of the ballot would be pushed to April 11, 2010 from
April 5, said a statement from the Commission on state news agency Suna.
The elections -- parliamentary, presidential and local -- have been delayed
twice before from their original date of July this year, set under the terms
of a 2005 peace deal that ended more than two decades of civil war between
north and south Sudan.
The timing of the poll has been a sensitive issue as any significant delay
would push the vote into the start of the rainy season in May when large
parts of Sudan are inaccessible.
Some southerners fear a long delay could encroach on a referendum on
southern independence promised in January 2011 under the same peace accord.
North Sudan's dominant National Congress Party (NCP) on Sunday said it
supported the latest small delay, which would give voters more time to sign
up.
"We are afraid that a large extension of the elections will take us to the
rainy season. But six days will not do that ... Most of the parties have
asked for an extension. This is not going to be controversial," senior NCP
official Ibrahim Ghandour told Reuters.
No one was immediately available to comment from the Sudan People's
Liberation Movement (SPLM), the dominant party in the south.
The SPLM and opposition parties have previously said they would boycott the
elections if a package of democratic laws they see as necessary for the vote
was not drafted and passed by Nov. 30.
Delays in implementing the 2005 north-south peace deal have raised tensions
with less than five months until the elections. (Reporting by Andrew
Heavens; Editing by Janet Lawrence) ((Khartoum newsroom +249 910 641393
andrew.heavens@thomsonreuters.com))
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