It was 5 October 2007 when the election, planned for November, was finally called off. At that time, the Long Term Observers (LTOs) from the European Union Election Observation Mission (EUEOM) were boarding or waiting to board flights from various airports in London, Paris, Frankfurt, Rome, Brussels and other places in Europe; none of them expected that the election would be cancelled.

The first task for the Chief, after deciding not to resign from his post, was to attend a meeting with the Chief Observer of the European Union's Mission, Jan Mulder, who was also a Member of the European Parliament. This meeting, arranged before the postponement, was to discuss details of the election observation mobilisation.

The second pressing task for the Chief was to deal with the UN's international advisors across Nepal's 75 districts. He feared that if they went home now they might not be available when needed later. The political party leaders could decide to hold an election at any time. But if the Commission retained them, for the foreseeable future there would be no work for them to do—and this would be an unacceptable expense.

The third thing the Chief had to do was to deal with the Returning Officers, who had been sent for the November poll. An election budget had already been allocated to each of them. With the election postponed, there was the danger of overspending, misuse of funds, or even embezzlement by officials.