GE2020: ELD admits mistake after officials told woman she couldn't vote on Polling Day

For one Singaporean woman, Polling Day was fraught with frustration as she repeatedly tried to cast her vote, only to end up settling for marking her choice on a tendered ballot paper which would not be counted.

As it turns out, the entire debacle was caused by human error and miscommunication between two election officials, the Elections Department (ELD) admitted in a statement on Wednesday (July 15). 

The 36-year-old woman, identified only as Mdm Lum, had initially made a police report after she was not able to cast her vote on July 10 as the register reflected that she had already voted, Lianhe Wanbao reported.

Recounting her experience to the Chinese daily, Lum said that she had first arrived at her designated polling station, Block 23A Ghim Moh Link, at about 12.30pm that day.

Things went smoothly until she had to scan her identity card under a reader to register her attendance and an error message popped up.

After several unsuccessful attempts to scan her identity card, an election official assisted her, typing her NRIC into the registration system manually, the woman, who belongs to Holland-Bukit Timah GRC recalled.

To her surprise, she was told her NRIC had already been used to vote earlier.

Lum maintained that she had not cast her vote yet, nor has she ever lost her identity card.

According to her, an official asked her if she "really wanted to vote" before issuing a tendered ballot paper to her. She also had to sign an Oath of Identity form to confirm her identity and to declare that she had not already voted.

However, it was only after she received the tendered ballot that the official explained to her that it would not be counted in the final tally.

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Tendered ballot papers are blue in colour and are issued to people who apply to cast their vote even after the Presiding Officer has informed them that they have already voted, according to the register.

According to the Parliamentary Elections Act, tendered ballot papers are not counted. Instead, they are placed into separate packets, sealed and retained.

Lum called ELD that afternoon to provide feedback on the issue and was advised by an ELD employee to make a police report, she said.

She later returned to the polling station at about 2pm and made another phone call to ELD at about 5pm but her efforts to have her vote counted were in vain.

This is her third time voting in an election but the first time that this issue has cropped up, she said.

Mistake in registration process was "wrongly communicated", says ELD

In response to AsiaOne's queries, ELD clarified that Lum's NRIC was not used to register to vote on Polling Day.

"The mistake was due to human error and miscommunication between the two election officials handling her registration on Polling Day."

The Presiding Officer (PO) was not able to register Lum's NRIC as he had "not switched out of the wrong module of the e-Registration system," ELD explained.

"The PO then escalated this to the Assistant Returning Officer (ARO). However, a miscommunication between the PO and ARO led the latter to interpret that Mdm Lum's NRIC number had already been used to register for voting earlier in the day. This was then wrongly communicated to Mdm Lum."

ELD has reached out to Lum to clarify the matter and to apologise, it added. Her name will be restored to the Registers of Electors without penalty.

But that wasn't all that went wrong on Polling Day — 13 voters staying in hotels for the duration of their stay home notices were not able to vote after their names were omitted from the list submitted by Marina Bay Sands to ELD.

Other voters also complained of long queues and crowded polling stations.

The long queues at certain polling stations also led to ELD extending voting hours until 10pm, instead of ending at the usual 8pm.

Responding to a Straits Times forum letter, Head of ELD Koh Siong Ling apologised for the inconvenience caused to voters on July 13 and said ELD would conduct a thorough review of what went wrong.

kimberlylim@asiaone.com