Ruling coalition partner Adhaalath Party has begun accepting applications of those interested in contesting in the upcoming parliamentary elections on its ticket.
The religiously conservative party announced on Thursday that the party will be contesting for 13 seats in the elections scheduled for April, and instructed interested candidates to submit their applications along with required documents before 2pm on January 20.
The coalition parties had previously agreed to contest both the parliamentary election and the local council elections through the coalition in order to ensure maximum number of seats.
According to the original agreement, main ruling Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) will contest for 35 seats while Jumhoory Party, Maumoon Reform Movement and Adhaalath Party will contest for 22, 17 and 13 seats respectively.
However, Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) decided at its National Council to contest for all 87 constituencies in the parliamentary election, despite the existing coalition agreement to divide up the seats among themselves.
The four leaders of the coalition have sat down several times with President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih in attempt to resolve the dispute. However, an agreement has not been reached thus far.
The rest of the coalition partners have already opened submission of application for candidates interesting in the election on their respective party tickets.
President of Adhaalath Party, Sheikh Imran Abdulla with Vice President of party, Ali Zahir
