The presidential election in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) scheduled on Sunday has been cancelled and will now be held a week later on December 30.
The country’s election commission on Thursday said it was not prepared to hold the elections following a fire that destroyed voting machines as well as the Ebola outbreak in the east.
“The presidential, legislative and provincial elections will, therefore, take place on December 30, 2018,” head of the Independent National Election Commission (CENI), Corneille Nangaa, said.
DRC's electoral commission chief Corneille Nangaa making the announcement in Kinshasa [Baz Ratner/Reuters]
Last week, a fire in an election commission warehouse destroyed nearly 80 percent of the 10,000 voting machines in the capital, Kinshasa.
Nangaa said officials have found enough voting machines for Kinshasa but had to get five million new ballots printed.
He appealed to the country’s 46 million voters for calm.
DRC’s elections, postponed repeatedly since 2016, are meant to choose a successor to President Joseph Kabila, who is due to step down after 18 years in power.
The DRC has not seen a peaceful transition of power since it gained independence from Belgium in 1960.
Aljazeera
