Puntland announced that it would be shutting down the local National Independent Electoral Commission (NIEC) Somalia office.
The NIEC office in Garowe will not be open, the interior ministry of Puntland declared. It cited “electoral law stalemate” as the reason for closing the local office.
Somalia’s poll agency has encountered internal struggles in the face of mounting differences between the FGS and regional states.
The differences are because of an electoral law recently passed at the Federal Parliament’s Lower House Chamber. It is now at the Senate awaiting approval.
NIEC is in a rush to get ready for the upcoming general elections despite the inability of political stakeholders to agree on the preferred model.
Somalia has not held people-driven polls because of more than five decades of internal conflicts. Al-Shabaab has made it impossible to conduct such polls in recent times.