Maldives National Democratic Party's National Council has decided to delay the party's internal elections to May of this year following a heated meeting held last night.
The party's internal election was initially scheduled to be held on April 16 but is now tabled to be held on May 14 after many MDP members had expressed concerns that the initial date had fallen on Ramadan.
Members of the party's National Council voted to change the election date last night and the delay was passed with 100 votes. A total of 115 National Council members had taken part in the meeting held at Imadudeen school last night.
The vote follows a heated meeting with factions within the party raising their voices against each other as the hotly contested MDP Chairperson's post threatens to further divide the country's most popular political party.
The party's former spokesperson and current MP for Maafannnu Uthuru MP Imthiyaz Fahmy is competing against the current Economic Minister Ismail Fayyaz who has the support of President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih.
While Council Members backing Fayyaz had called for the delay in elections, they had said that it would be difficult to hold the internal elections during Ramadan.
However, those supporting MP Imthiyaz had argued that MDP is a big enough party that it is capable of organizing the election as initially agreed.
