MONGKOL BANGPRAPA

The Election Commission (EC) expects to complete consideration of 88 complaints and call re-elections where necessary before Feb 21, said its secretary-general yesterday.

The complaints, mainly involving polling in the Northeast, are among a total of 388 that already received preliminary investigations and were forwarded to the EC to rule on, said Pol Maj-Gen Ekkachai Varunprapa.

Of the total, 207 have grounds for the commission to further investigate, 88 are groundless and 91 are still being investigated.

Since the EC is required to announce all 500 House election winners within 30 days, some might be yellow-carded or red-carded later, he said.

Pol Maj-Gen Ekkachai said the EC has received no election-related complaints at all from 31 provinces and the winners there should be announced after three days from now.

He also said that while the vote turn-out was higher than the EC's target of 70%, the number of invalid ballots was high as well.

The EC has already ordered re-elections at four polling units in three provinces tomorrow . They are the 3rd polling station in Satun's constituency 2 where there were not enough ballots for eligible voters, the 8th polling station in Nakhon Ratchasima's constituency 5 where the number of ballots cast exceeded that of eligible voters, and the 51st and 56th polling stations in Trang's constituency 1 where the number of ballots did not match that of those who cast votes.

Commissioner Gen Charupat Ruangsuwan said the number of complaints in the 19 northeastern provinces has dropped significantly in this election, from over 200 to only 93.

He said most of the complaints involved ``same old'' provinces of Udon Thani, Ubon Ratchathani and Surin. They included allegations that certain candidates had promised something in return for votes, and that some candidates had organised parties with various forms of entertainment in breach of camapagin rules.

Gen Charupat said the people had exercised their rights under the constitution in this election, all parties concerned including non-governmental organisations should respect its outcome which reflected the majority's decision.

Gen Charupat also expressed satisfaction with the election as a whole and the high voter turn-out, saying the EC would present a silver ballot box replica to polling stations which recorded a turn-out of over 75%, and a gold one to those with a turn-out of over 80%.