27 election lists approved by CAEAL

The Electoral Affairs Commission for the Legislative Assembly Election (CAEAL) has confirmed that as of June 21 it has approved 27 applications from respective nomination committees, out of a total of 31 submissions.

Of those applications approved, 21 included lists for the direct election process and six for the indirect election process, the Chairman of the Commission Tong Hio Fong said, according to a statement from the Government Information Bureau.

Campaign teams wishing to contest the 2017 Legislative Assembly Election on September 17 were required to submit their applications to form nomination committees by June 20.

According to the statement, Tong said that there were a number of reasons why the adjudications on four applications were still pending. He said that either the election team had submitted applications containing fewer than the required 300 voter signatories, or a team’s proposed logo was similar to an existing registered trademark.

The Commission will now notify the teams concerned and advise them to submit the necessary supplementary material within five days, starting from the date of notice.

Once application processing has been completed, Tong said that the CAEAL will announce a list of all of the approved nomination committees.

Moreover, the Commission noted that it has identified a total of 103 individuals signing the nomination papers of more than one nomination committee, contrary to the electoral rules. This is a significant increase from the two cases of double signatories reported by the CAEAL on May 17.

It was also decided by the Commission on Wednesday, that they will return the same kind of translucent curtains used in the 2013 Legislative Assembly election, which will “enable polling station staff […] to guard against irregularities in voting, while at the same time ensuring sufficient privacy.”