Bill to limit council by-elections to once a year sent to committee

The bill proposing amendments to the Local Council Elections Act in order to limit by-elections for vacancies in local councils and women’s development committees to once a year has been forwarded to Parliament’s Decentralization Committee for review.

In a vote taken during Monday’s parliamentary sitting, 59 members in attendance unanimously voted to sent the bill for review to Decentralization Committee.

The bill was submitted by the government, sponsored by Velidhoo MP Mohamed Abdulla Shafeeq.

It is designed to change deadline for holding by-elections from 60 days to 365 days.

It stipulates that the duration between two by-elections must not be less than 300 days.

Apart from this, a government bill to amend the Decentralization Act, also sponsored by MP Shafeeq, was forwarded to Decentralization Committee for review.

The bill stipulates that if a vacancy opens in a local council during an ongoing term, the Local Government Authority (LGA) must inform the Election Commission (EC) of the vacancy within 14 days.

It states that a by-election is not mandatory if a council seat falls vacant with one year or less than one year left in term.

However, if vacancies lead to a lack of quorum to hold council meetings, EC must hold by-elections within 60 days LGA informing it of the vacancies.

The two bills come amid a high number of resignations within councils, and especially WDCs, leading to huge expenditure on holding by-elections.

The EC, which has a total MVR 1.5 million allocated to hold by-elections, and announced it had already spent MVR 1.4 million on WDC by-elections by May.