PORT-AU-PRINCE (AP) - Haiti's electoral board yesterday again postponed the first elections since the ouster of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide - saying it needs more time to organise the vote in the impoverished country.

The nine-member Provisional Electoral Council set a new date of January 8 for presidential and legislative elections, followed by a February 15 runoff.

Council members said they would be unable to set up polling sites by December 27 - the election date announced last week by interim Prime Minister Gerard Latortue - because of the crumbling infrastructure and a lack of trained election workers in the poorest nation in the Americas.

This marks the fourth date Haitian authorities have set for the elections to replace the interim government installed after a violent rebellion forced Aristide to flee the country for exile in South Africa in February 2004.

The latest postponement means Haiti will now miss an important constitutional deadline for the inauguration of a new president, February 7.

Voters will choose from about 35 candidates for president and hundreds of candidates for 129 legislative seats.

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