CaFFE

 Ministry of Local Government and Provincial Councils has extended the tenure of the Delimitation Review Committee to December 31. Campaign for Free and Fair Elections (CaFFE) believes that this move by the ministry is another subtle manoeuvre to delay the local government elections.

In the past few months the ministry has employed a number of ploys to delay the elections, extending the tenure of the committee is only one of them. CaFFE sees this as an attack on the democratic rights of the people. In a democracy the citizens have the ability to elect those who would govern them; it is one of the foundations of representative democracy.

CaFFE is aware that the Committee has finalized its report into discrepancies regarding demarcation of boundaries and claimed shortcomings of the report submitted by the National Delimitation Commission (NDC) in 2012. The Tamil and English translations of the report are underway. Meanwhile the Department of Survey has is currently mapping the limits of local councils and the process can be completed by the first week of November, technical officers involved in the process claim.

The Ministry stated that it took this decision due to a request made by the Committee; however CaFFE has confirmed that such a request has not been made. It is almost a year since the committee has been appointed and CaFFE has noted that the ministry has used this committee to delay the election. CaFFE urges the ministry to hold the local government election without delaying it strategically.