2nd day of absentee voting sees some chaos

In Samut Sakhon, Arna Limcharoen, the 59-year-old owner of Mahachai Muang Mai market, tore up her two ballot papers after making a mistake.

She said she did not intend to tear but angered herself after tick "wrong number". When she asked official to change papers, the official denied, she said she angered and decides to tear the papers.

She was arrested after destroyed papers before her temporary release on bail of Bt20,000.

While, the Election Commission appointed a panel to investigate election commission in Roi Et who broken a law by burned ballot paper in the first day.

Election Commissioner Somchai Jungprasert said after received report, it is "honest mistake" was not intend to destroy the paper.

"They will destroy the papers in the national referendum but picked the advance ballot papers to destroy," he said.

An activist group who called itself "Thammapiban group" (Good Governance) Sunday submitted a letter to Pol Gen Wichien Pojphosri, deputy national police chief who is in charge of the advance balloting to inspect frauds in three constituencies in Bangkok.

Suthas Anantapong, deputy chairman of the group said in the letter that they found there are buses transport voters to go to ballot in constituency 7. Election commission at polling station in constituency 6 broke the law by allow voters who did not register to go to ballot without ask necessary.

According to the election law, voters who did not register in the advance voting can cast their ballot in their city hall but the official in polling station must ask voter's essential before allow to the ballot.

Suthas said that in constituency 5 found a group of people counted voters in front of polling station and there are buses to transport voters.

Two major party leaders have asked the Election Commission to allow them to inspect the place where advance votes are being stored.

People Power leader Samak Sundaravej said he was worried about the possibility of fraud during storage.

"I don't know where the ballot boxes are being stored or the security measures. I trust the five election commissioners but other officials could be unreliable," he said.

Democrat leader Abhisit Vejjajiva said EC officials should allow party representatives to help the process of protecting the boxes.

Banned Thai Rak Thai executive Chaturon Chaisang said most advance voters in Bangkok were Northeast and North people. He believed they would vote for the same party but did not say which party would benefit from the advance ballot.

He also expressed concern about storage of votes. "If the EC fails to protect the box storage, it means there is a fraud in this election," said Chaturon.

People Power secretarygeneral Surapong Suebwonglee said he did not know which party would benefit from a high turnout in the advance ballot.

"We only hope the voting process will be fair," he said.

He said several factors would ensure the advance turnout was higher than in the last election. People were keen to vote because they wanted a return to democracy and, after the government announced December 24 as an extra holiday, people came out to cast advance votes in order to go on vacation this weekend.

He was concerned about security for the advance ballot. "It is a duty of the Election Commission to look after the boxes, as we know some districts invited party representatives to see storage places but some did not," he said.

Surapong said this election would have a lot of invalid votes because the party had received information that people who registered for the advance ballot had voted for candidates in their present constituency instead of candidates in their hometown.

Election commissioner Somchai Jungprasert insisted security had been tightened to protect ballot boxes.

He said the EC had not invited party representatives to inspect storage places because there were more than 60 parties, making it difficult for all to attend.

"The EC could not allow only major parties to inspect the storage. We are afraid of being accused of double standards. But they [parties] can send their persons to observe our keeping," he said.

EC officials in Satun and Nakhon Si Thammarat said more than 80 per cent of registered advance voters came out to ballot.

In Mae Hong Son, an official believed about 75 per cent cast their votes.

In Samut Prakan, traffic was jammed for more than three hours by advance voters.

The Nation