South Sudan has again postponed its first national elections since independence in 2011, moving polling from December 22, 2026, to February 11, 2027.
The National Elections Commission published a revised timetable on Saturday, November 14, 2026 — the day voter registration was scheduled to begin — on social media. The document gave no reason for the postponement.
Voter registration runs from November 14 to 28 at 3,161 registration centres across the country’s 10 states and three administrative areas, commission chairperson Gabriel Bol Deng said.
The polls have been repeatedly delayed, including in 2022 and 2024. The postponement follows warnings from the United Nations and the African Union that elections could further unravel the fragile peace. Anita Kiki Gbeho, head of the UN mission in South Sudan, told the UN Security Council on November 10 that there had been little electoral activity among parties other than the ruling SPLM.
Funding is also short: the commission has received only $21 million of the $276 million it requested to organise the elections, according to Reuters.
Under the revised timetable, campaigning runs from December 27, 2026, to February 9, 2027, with February 10 as a silence day.
South Sudan became independent from Sudan in 2011. Conflict broke out in 2013 between forces loyal to President Salva Kiir and followers of rival Riek Machar, and a peace deal was signed in 2018. A transitional unity government formed in 2020 was dissolved in September 2026 and replaced by a caretaker administration. Machar has been under house arrest since March 2025 and is on trial with seven co-defendants on charges including treason, murder and crimes against humanity; they deny the charges.
Source: Arab News
