Election monitor People’s Action For Free & Fair Elections (PAFFREL) has decided to go before the courts if the government attempts to postpone elections, its Executive Director, Rohana Hettiarachchi said on Friday.Hettiarachchi said that the Elections Commission has to declare a day for the local council election by the end of the first week of January.

“According to election law and the constitution, the Commission has to hold elections and gazette the names of those who were elected to local councils by 19 March,” he said. The PAFFREL Executive Director said that it is obvious that the government is trying to postpone elections through constitutional and unconstitutional means.

“The government is making various baseless comments about how the country will be adversely affected if elections are held now. I can’t think how being democratic and transparent

would be bad for the country. If anything, the image of the country will improve greatly in the international system,” he said.Hettiarachchi said the Elections Commission has shown interest in holding the election. Already, the commission has appointed district returning officers and has gazetted their names.

“The Commission has also met the district returning officers. However, we are also seeing the government coming up with various ploys to delay elections. We met the Prime Minister Dinseh Gunawardena two weeks ago and we told him if you delay elections we will go to court.

The PM said they won’t delay the elections. We will see what the government tries to pull off in the coming weeks,” he said.