The Supervisor of Elections has today clarified that the Fijian Elections Office acted in accordance with the law when taking measures against the suspended Social Democratic Liberal Party two weeks ago.

Mohammed Saneem in a press conference this afternoon stated that they gave the suspended SODELPA every opportunity to fix up the irregularities until the drastic measures against them became absolutely necessary.

The clarification comes following an opinion piece in yesterday’s the Fiji Times which stated that the FEO took unnecessary step to suspend the registration of SODELPA meaning a large part of the Opposition cannot participate in parliament all for a minor technicality.

The opinion piece stated that the Supervisor of Election could have simply ordered the suspended SODELPA to fix up the irregularities within the next month, failing which he would take drastic against them.

However, Saneem says the suspended SODELPA was provided ample time from April 27th to comply with the decision of the High Court and furnish the necessary documents to the Registrar of Political Parties, but they failed to do so.

“In the weeks it became clear the party was not in any position to take appropriate remedial action as was well documented by the media. Leaving my office no choice but to suspend the Party.”

The Registrar of Political Parties suspended SODELPA for breach of the Political Parties Act on May 26^th.

The party elected two sets of officials during its annual general meeting held by two factions of the part at separate venues last month to run the affairs of the party.

All appointees were declared null and void by the Registrar, and the suspended Party was given 60 days to rectify all issues or face de-registration.

Saneem says the suspended SODELPA now has until July 27^th to remedy their failures.

“This timeline of events that I have noted today was also noted in my media statement on 26^th of May and there has been no dispute to the contrary. You will note that even though the registrar gave SODELPA time from 27^th April it effectively had time from 23^rd April to comply with the court order and remedy all the issues.”

He says giving the considerable length of time provided to the suspended party to correct its action and the seriousness of their failures, it is simply not honest to paint this decision as abrupt or without precedence.