Abdoulaye Maiga, the spokesperson for the junta-led Mali government, announced on Monday the postponement of the two rounds of voting initially set for February 4 and 18, 2024, in Mali.
In a statement released on Monday in Mali, Maiga attributed the postponement to “technical reasons”, adding that “those reasons include issues linked to the adoption this year of a new constitution and a review of the electoral lists.”
Also, he stated that a dispute with the French company Idemia, which the Malian junta says is involved in the census process, necessitated the postponement.
“The new dates for the presidential election will be communicated later,” the Mali spokesman said.
The junta is also refusing to organise legislative elections, initially scheduled for the end of 2023, before the presidential election.
The junta “has decided to organise, exclusively, the presidential election,” the statement said.
Other elections, according to the statement, will be held on a schedule “established by the new authorities, under the directives of the new president.”
The postponement is a further blow to the junta’s plan to transfer control to elected civilians.
The troops, who staged two coups in 2020 and 2021, had previously pledged legislative elections in February 2022.
However, the junta, led by Assimi Goita, said at the end of 2021 that it would be unable to adhere to the timeframe agreed upon with the regional body, ECOWAS.
The statement on Monday made no note of recent security developments, just stating that junta head Goita intended “to return to a peaceful and secure constitutional order, after carrying out, as a priority, institutional political reforms.”
