Updated voter rolls open for inspection

Updated voter rolls open for inspection

THE lists of Singaporeans eligible to vote at the next general election have been updated and are open for public inspection, the Elections Department (ELD) said yesterday.

It also announced a new overseas polling station in Dubai and, in a separate notice in the electronic version of the Government Gazette, said the boundaries of polling districts have been changed.

It said in its statement that the voter rolls, or registers of electors, will be open for inspection from today to March 9.

Updating the voter rolls is an exercise to keep them up to date. With the latest revision, they now hold the names of 2,458,880 qualified electors as of Feb 1 this year.

Singaporeans can check their details via the Elections Department website (www.eld.gov.sg), at its Prinsep Link premises, or at community centres. Those overseas can do so at Singapore missions serving as polling stations.

During the inspection period, a person can ask for his particulars - name, gender or address as in his identity card - to be updated. He should make sure his name is listed in the correct constituency based on the address in his IC as of Feb 1 this year.

Eligible voters whose names are not in the registers - because they were omitted or they were dropped for not voting at a previous election - can apply to have their names included or restored.

They are encouraged to do so early as applications close with the issue of the Writ of Election.

The writ is the legal document that sets the election process in motion. The next polls must be held by January 2017 at the latest.

An elector can object to another person being listed in his constituency if he knows that that person belongs to another constituency.

The ELD said Singapore's Consulate-General in Dubai has been designated an overseas polling station. It joins nine others - in New York, Washington DC, San Francisco, London, Shanghai, Beijing, Hong Kong, Tokyo and Canberra. These missions also serve as overseas registration centres.

"The overseas polling station and registration centre in Dubai will facilitate overseas voting and registration for overseas Singaporeans in the Middle East region," the ELD said.

From today, citizens living abroad and whose names are in the voter rolls can register as overseas electors if they have lived in Singapore for at least 30 days between Feb 1, 2012 and Jan 31 this year. They can do so at one of the designated overseas polling stations. Overseas voters have to re-register after each revision of the registers.

Yesterday, the ELD also announced changes made to the boundaries of polling districts.

A 100-page notice in the electronic Government Gazette listed the 27 electoral divisions - from Aljunied to Yuhua - and the number of polling districts in each. Pasir Ris-Punggol is the largest with 72, and Potong Pasir the smallest with five.

Changes to polling districts are made to ensure no polling station handles too many or too few voters. Similar changes were last made a year ago, after a revision of the voter rolls, also in February.

Polling districts are sub-units within constituencies. But new constituency boundaries are decided only when the Electoral Boundaries Review Commission meets. Its convening is a key step on the road to an election being called. In 2006 and 2011, it issued its boundaries report about four months after it convened.

The polls were held in May in both those years.

rachelay@sph.com.sg


This article was first published on Feb 24, 2015.
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