DUSHANBE, March 7, 2011, Asia-Plus - The Central Commission for Elections and Referenda (CCER) will set the date for parliamentary by-election (special election) in Dushanbe’s constituency # 4 on March 15, the source at CCER said.

The by-election will be called following appointment of Shermuhammad Shohiyon who formerly represented this constituency in the Majlisi Namoyandagon (Tajikistan’s lower chamber of parliament) as the CCER chairman.   

To-date, only three of eight political parties officially registered in the country, namely People’s Democratic, Islamic Revival and Agrarian parties have announced their readiness to nominate their candidates for by-election in this constituency.

Representatives of Communist and Democratic parties have noted that they will not participate in the by-election.  The Party of Economic Reforms and the Socialist Party have not yet decided on this issue.

In the meantime, the Social-Democratic Party leader Rahmatillo Zoirov says his party will participate in the by-election only under the condition that its members will be included into divisional electoral commissions.