Cook Islands United Party will not nominate a candidate for the Penrhyn By-election.

The Penrhyn by-election will be held on March 12 and nominations of candidates will close on February 23. Chief Electoral Officer, Tagggy Tangimetua issued the notice yesterday.

As political parties are organising who will be their candidate for the Penrhyn seat, Cook Islands United Party says they will not be nominating any candidate.

Party leader Teariki Heather said four weeks was not enough to contest for an election.

Heather said they would let the Democratic Party have a candidate as it is a small constituency and they have been given a short time.

He added that four weeks was not enough and it would have been better if they were given 60 days to fairly contest for the seat.

Democratic Party leader Tina Browne said they have a list of names for the candidacy nomination but they were yet to be confirmed.

Cook Islands Party vice-president Rohan Ellis says the transition process will be discussed and finalised by the Executive Committee very soon.

Yesterday, the notice was issued where it was stated that the nomination of candidates closed on February 23 at 12 noon with a sum of $500 to be lodged to the chief electoral officer or the deputy register on the island of Penrhyn.

Main roll closes on February 13, 4pm, objections to names on the main roll close on February 20, 4pm. Supplementary roll extended to close on February 27, 4pm and objection to the names on the supplementary roll closes on March 5, 4pm.

The by-election comes after Prime Minister Mark Brown last week confirmed the Tongareva seat vacant after former deputy prime minister Robert Tapaitau’s conviction.

Tapaitau, former National Environment Service (NES) director Nga Puna and Puna’s wife, Diane Charlie-Puna, the former secretary of Infrastructure Cook Islands, were found guilty of fraud and PM Brown said “no person is above the law”.

Brown said that the Cook Islands Party-led coalition government accepted and would abide by the court’s decision.

He said the ruling meant that the Tongareva seat was vacant, and the Ministerial warrant held by Tapaitau was also automatically vacated.

The trio are due to be sentenced in March.