42 candidates to contest

**Prime Minister James Marape, Pangu leader, was there to endorse Samuel. – Picture from LOHIA BOE SAMUEL Facebook page**

By CLIFFORD FAIPARIK
FORTY-TWO candidates will contest the Moresby North-West by-election, acting electoral commissioner Simon Sinai says.
Some of the candidates include prominent personalities in former chief justice Sir Arnold Amet, former Community Development, Youth and Religion secretary Anna Bais and former Finance secretary Thaddeus Kambanei as well as several candidates from the 2017 elections in Joseph Tonde and Lohia Boe Samuel.
Nominations closed on Thursday (March 4).
Sinai said the 2017 common roll would be used for the by-election which recorded 90,000 voters.
“There are five local level governments in North West and there will be 112 polling teams,” he said.
“We will use the latest counting plan we used in the by-elections for Goroka Open and Bougainville Regional.”
Sinai said campaigning had been delayed for almost two weeks due to the nationwide mourning of the late Grand Chief Sir Michael Somare as well as the recent upsurge of the Covid-19 cases in the city.
“I will now advise the governor-general on the rescheduled dates of the by election,” he said.
Sinai said the drawing of candidate’s box numbers would be done on March 18 and that would be when campaigning officially starts.
There will be eight weeks of campaigning (from March 18 to May 5) and polling will be from May 15-29. The writs will be returned to the governor-general on June 10.