Case on Sunday polling to return for court directions

National

A CASE questioning the legality of Sunday polling conducted in Ialibu-Pangia will return to court on Aug 14 for it to give further directions to the parties.
Referrer Stanley Liria, who lost to Peter O’Neill for the seat, obtained the orders from the Supreme Court on Monday, allowing his lawyer to serve court documents to other parties through publication in the dailies.
This means that all candidates who contested the Ialibu-Pangia seat would have been deemed to have been served documents by Liria through the publications.
The court named the Electoral Commission as the first intervener, the State as the second, O’Neill as the third intervener and Justus Rapula as the fourth intervener.
According to the court order, any of the candidates for the Ialibu-Pangia electorate who wishes to intervene and be heard in the reference should file and serve on the referrer a notice of appearance by Aug 11.
Liria had asked the court to clarify the section of the Organic Law on National and Local Level Government Elections which mentioned the legality of voting on a Sunday. Polling in the electorate was conducted on Sunday, July 2.