The Commission Against Corruption (CCAC) considered that light meals provided to some elderly residents are not to be considered as cases of electoral corruption, the commissioner André Cheong said during a press conference for the presentation of the final preliminary results of the Legislative Assembly elections.
“After analysis we decided that the act [providing a light meal] cannot constitute bribery,” Cheong said, adding, “The breakfast was provided by the retirement home and only involved a bottle of soya milk and a bun,” noting that there is no proof that such a meal was provided with the condition of a vote, noting that such judgment is based on “analysis and the law.”
Answering media questions, Cheong noted that the CCAC has inspected a total of 800 restaurants in order to “see if they organized any large-scale free meal [event] provided by any association.”
Cheong said that such events were not found in any of the CCAC inspections.
According to the commissioner, inspections were also made to local Rent-a-Car companies in order to know if there were are reserves made for the Election Day, in order to follow up and guarantee that no illegality was committed.
Cheong noted, “to provide assistance in transportation to people with mobility difficulties or elderlies is not illegal,” he said, “as long as during that transportation there are no tries to condition their vote.”
Doing a review on the positive side of the election process in terms of illegal actions and crimes, Cheong noted, “Until 9p.m. [yesterday] there were a total of 25 complaints including bribery and other activities. Which results in a significant drop since in the previous election we registered a total of 46 reported cases.”
