Civil Court late Sunday ordered the country's electoral watchdog to extend the deadline for re-registration of voters for the upcoming local council elections.
Elections Commission had set the re-registration deadline until Monday but has now left the re-registration window open indefinitely following the court order.
According to a recent amendment to the local council Act, the number of councilors to be elected on January 14 will be down to 655 from the present 1,077.
The number of island councilors is currently 945, but the amendment has brought the number to 585. Next year’s polls would also elect 70 Atoll councilors instead of the present 132
According to the amendment, three island councilors would need to be elected from islands with 3,000 or less populations while five would be elected from islands with 3,000 or more people. Only two Atoll councilors will represent two electoral constituencies while one will be elected if the electoral constituency is more than two.
The civil court order came hours after the ruling Progressive Party of Maldives (PPM) asked the archipelago's civil court to postpone the local elections by two months.
