EC begins going through results today

ELECTION 2007

EC begins going through results today

If needed, by-elections will be held on Jan 13

MONGKOL BANGPRAPA

The Election Commission (EC) will today begin considering the 1,030 election-related complaints it has received and the confirmation of winning candidates free of allegations. Boonkiart Rakchartcharoen, the EC's election management director, said the official announcement of winning candidates will be divided into two groups.

Winners with no complaints against them will be announced in seven days. Decisions on those who are the subject of complaints will be given within 30 days, which is the deadline for the convening of the new House of Representatives under the constitution.

He gave an assurance that any disqualifications would be concluded within the deadline and by-elections called.

In the event there are disqualifications, or red cards, the by-elections will be held on Jan 13, he said.

EC deputy secretary-general for investigation Jarungwit Phumma said of the complaints considered so far, 678 could not be substantiated.

''We are doing our best but we receive little cooperation from the public,'' he said. ''The number of the people who received vote-buying money and reported the fraud to the EC is only in two digits.

''The election also saw a handful of complainants who are candidates. But most complainants claimed to represent non-government organisations that are not related to any political parties,'' Mr Jarungwit said.

He said the commission had received 139 objections to candidates from many political parties, and 38 objections concern vote buying.

EC investigators will quickly forward the objections concerning winning candidates so the commission can consider whether to disqualify them within 30 days.

The commission announced that 70.27% of the 45.65 million eligible voters, or 32 million people, went to the polling stations but the number of no-vote ballots skyrocketed.Secretary-general Suthipol Thaweechaikarn said the EC had expected the most invalid ballots from the constituency election because voters often had to tick three boxes instead of just one, but this was not the case. There were twice as many invalid ballots in the proportional representation system, which required voters to check only one party box.

He said 876,748 people chose to cast no-vote ballots, opting not to make a choice, under proportional representation, three-times the number in the last valid general election, on Feb 6, 2005.

The number of no-vote ballots cast for constituency seats nearly doubled to 1,390,074.