AMMAN — More than 3,000 candidates have registered
for elections to municipal and provincial councils in various regions of Jordan
until Monday evening, according to the
Independent Election Commission (IEC).
اضافة اعلان
President of the IEC Board of Commissioners Khaled
Kalaldeh told Al-Mamlakeh TV that “more than 40 electoral publicity violations
and nine black money infractions were recorded.” He added that by the end of
the first day, 14.9 percent of the candidates were women.
According to the Hayat Center, for
Civil Society Development (Rased), by midday on Monday, "260 candidates were running for
mayoral office, and 1,144 candidates for municipal and provincial councils."
Candidate registration centers
opened on schedule at 8:30am Monday morning in all registration centers across
the Kingdom.
The elections are being held
under the Local Administration (decentralization) and
Greater Amman Municipality (GAM) laws, covering 100 local councils and 12 governorate
councils with 25 percent of seats allocated to women under a quota system. For
the GAM council, voters will elect 28 candidates including six women.
Meanwhile, IEC board member Jihad Al-Momani said that candidates are allowed to begin campaigning as of
submitting their candidacy application, according to Jo24.
He added that setting up campaign headquarters are
"prohibited" at present due to the ongoing health crisis due to
COVID-19, and that the IEC would reconsider its decision based on the Epidemiological
Committee’s recommendations. He said any possible delay in the elections is the
government's responsibility and changing its date is the IEC’s decision, but
that work is underway to hold the elections on schedule.
Momani said that Jordan's elections are subject to
local and international monitoring and the placement of cameras at polling
stations is a new addition to integrity standards.
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