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Source: http://www.economist.com/world/africa/displayStory.cfm?story_id=4064976
A Slipping Election Timetable Will Favor the Islamists of Hamas
(Economist) Nobody said reforming the Palestinian Authority (PA) would be easy. Months of wrangling about the election due on July 17th to the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) had failed to produce a deal on how many seats to elect from national party lists and how many from local constituencies. Fatah, the PA's ruling party, with a strong brand (the late Yasser Arafat) but weak candidates (crusty timeservers loyal to him), would do better if it ran on national lists. Its rivals stand more of a chance in constituencies, where personal reputations and achievements count. Mahmoud Abbas could not reach a compromise within his own Fatah nor in the existing PLC, so he has put off the election indefinitely, though it is expected to be held only a few months late. More worrying for Abbas was Fatah's decision, a day after he postponed the election, to postpone its own party congress, set for August, when a younger, reformist generation was expected to vote old-guard members out of the party's ruling councils. The old-timers' main hope was to win seats in the PLC election first.