A TOTAL of 74 candidates contesting the 2019 National General Election (NGE) have failed to submit their statement of accounts before the dateline on Saturday 20th July 2019.
Commissioner and Chief Electoral Officer Mose Saitala in a statement to the paper yesterday those candidates have failed to comply with section 69 of the Electoral Act 2018.
“Section 69 of the Electoral Act requires all successful and unsuccessful candidates who contested the 2019 General Election to file with the Chief Electoral Officer their statement of account relating to expenses and source of funds for those expenses, within 90 days after the publication of the NGE election result,” he said.
Mr Saitala said by 4.30pm on Saturday, 2019 as the date line, only 251 candidates successfully submitted their statement of account.
“One more candidate filed his statement of account on 21 July (late by one day) bringing the total of those who had filed their statements of account to 252,” he said.
He added there are also five (5) candidates who submitted their statement of account before the deadline but were assessed to be incomplete.
Saitala said there are no contact details for these five candidates and so it has been difficult to contact them to correct and complete their statements of account.
“By way of this statement I am requesting the following candidates Tommy Tagili (North Malaita Constituency), Christopher R. Taluu (North Guadalcanal), Allen K Taveke (Gao/Bugotu), Heinz Koiga (South Guadalcanal) and Stephen Roni (South New Georgia) to quickly contact the Electoral Office so we can help you to correct your statement of account,” he said.
Meanwhile, the statement added the final number of candidates who contested election in the 50 constituencies during the 2019 General Election was 331.
“This means that as of today, 24 July, 74 candidates have still yet to file their statements of account. This brings a total of 79 candidates who have yet to file and/or complete their statements of account.”
By IAN M.KAUKUI
