The printing would have been started last weekend but it was postponed because four political parties namely the National Democratic Party, De Nieuwe Leeuw, the Volkspartij Leefbaar Suriname and Alternatief 20 had filed a lawsuit against the Central Main Polling Bureau (CHS) and the main polling stations. The lawsuit was filed after an appeal of before mentioned political parties at the Office of the President, did not have the desired result.  The court announced a ruling last weekend. “We had asked the judge to announce a ruling on April 20th at the latest. But because of the holidays we could not get the rulings sooner. The main polling stations must also take care of the lists of candidates that were at the focal point of the lawsuit. These lists must then be sent to the CHS. The Home Affairs Ministry will then be given the lists by the CHS. After that we will publish the lists before we can start printing them,” said the BIZA director who added that after the sample ballots are printed, the political parties will be given the opportunity to check them twice. If no mistakes are detected, the actual ballots can be printed.

Last week BIZA signed a contract with  Multiforms N.V. This company will reportedly print 900,000 ballots in total.  450,000 contain the names of the candidates for parliament while the other 450,000 contain the names of the candidates for the resort councils.