DR CONGO: Presidential election delayed until Dec 30

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 yesterday said it was not prepared to hold the elections following a fire that destroyed voting machines as well as the Ebola outbreak in […]

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 yesterday 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.

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.