The Legislative Assembly Electoral Affairs Committee (CAEAL) Monday began training civil servants that will be working at polling stations on Election Day about the rules and regulations of the direct and indirect legislative elections on September 15, such as verifying eligible voters and ballots.
The training session was held at the Tap Seac Multi-Sports Pavilion, where 1,362 civil servants from 71 government entities were in attendance.
Chief Executive Fernando Chui Sai On said he was confident that the staff would have complete knowledge of the entire voting process at polling stations at the end of the training period, so that the election would run smoothly.
“The government will ensure that the election will be held in a fair and just manner and also encourages voters to take part,” said Chui. “… We believe that with this training, you will have a deeper knowledge of election work and a better understanding of the relevant regulations.”
Answering reporters’ questions on how the committee will handle complaints regarding campaign activities, CAEAL President Ip Son Sang only said they would look at each case and deal with it according to the law.
“If citizens see something – such as text messaging – that they suspect constitutes early campaigning, they can immediately notify us about it. We’ll definitely look into it,” Ip was quoted by The Macau Post Daily as saying.
He once again appealed to voters to be sure they understand the correct way to cast their ballots, which is to stamp the box on the left of the electoral group’s name.
Voters in Macau vote for groups, not individual candidates.
But Ip did not say whether his committee would reveal their findings about the complaints to the public.
There will be at least two more training sessions in the run-up to the election, which will be held on September 15.
Meanwhile, the government announced in the Official Gazette (BO) yesterday the broadcastingtime allocated for each electoral group using free airtime on government- owned broadcaster TDM to promote their campaign platforms.(macaunews)
