OVERSEAS VOTERS

OVERSEAS VOTERS: 8.

Mr Viswa Sadasivan asked the Prime Minister (a) how many Singaporeans residing overseas are eligible voters in the next General Election (GE); (b) whether there are plans to modify the eligibility criteria to encourage more Singaporeans living abroad to participate in their country's GE; and (c) whether there have been modifications to the rules and modalities (eg, use of technology) to make it easier for those eligible to cast their votes.

The Deputy Prime Minister and Coordinating Minister for National Security (Mr Wong Kan Seng) (for the Prime Minister): Mr Speaker, Sir, t he National Population Secretariat estimates that there are about 180,000 Singaporeans residing overseas. But we are not sure how many amongst them are eligible to vote as overseas voters. Apart from meeting the conditions that eligible voters must be Singaporeans aged 21 and above, and must be listed on the current register of electors of a constituency, overseas Singaporeans also have to reside in Singapore for a cumulative period of 30 days within three years before the cut-off date of electoral registers, before they are considered eligible to register to vote overseas.

Mr Viswa Sadasivan asked whether there are plans to modify this eligibility criterion of residence. There are no such plans as the residential requirement was

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shortened only in August 2008 after the last General Election. Previously, overseas Singaporeans who wish to register as overseas voters must have resided in Singapore for a cumulative period of two years within five years immediately before a prescribed cut-off date which is the cut-off date for the registers of electors. Additionally, before the change of residential requirement, overseas Singaporeans had only 21 days to register. Now, the registration period has been extended up to the time when the Writ of Election is issued. Furthermore, the Elections Department has also introduced an online facility to make it more convenient for eligible overseas voters to register, and to apply to change their allotted overseas polling station or cancel their registration subsequently should they leave the city or country where they first registered as overseas voters. To allow more overseas Singaporeans access to overseas voting, New York City has been included as a polling station, making a total of nine.

Elections Department has studied other methods of voting, such as Internet voting and postal voting but found that these are not as robust and reliable as the tried and tested methods of marking a ballot paper. The Internet platform, while convenient, is vulnerable, for example, to power-outage, hacking and denial of service attacks. Without a printed voting slip, auditing the voting results in the event of a petition to the Election Judge can be problematic. As regards postal voting, there is no guarantee of voting secrecy, as we do not know who marked the ballot paper. It is also difficult to ensure that all ballots will be mailed back to the Elections Department on time to be counted. Missing votes will also cast doubt on the integrity of the process. In the UK where postal voting is permitted, there had been reports of electoral fraud.

For now, the paper ballot is still the simplest and most transparent method of

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voting that can ensure the integrity and secrecy of the voting process.

Ms Sylvia Lim (Non-Constituency Member): I wonder whether Deputy Prime Minister Wong could give the House an update on how many eligible voters have registered themselves so far for the coming General Election (GE)? The last round, we had about 1,000-odd voters. So I wonder if he can update us on whether the relaxed criteria has led to a larger number of people registering.

Mr Wong Kan Seng: May I ask when were the 1,000-odd voters made known?

Ms Sylvia Lim: Sir, I was referring to those registered for the previous GE. It was about 1,017.

Mr Wong Kan Seng: Sir, the previous GE registered only about 550-odd overseas voters and not 1,000-odd.

* *Ms Sylvia Lim: Sir, can I clarify? I have the data here actually. One thousand and seventeen registered but on Nomination Day only certain constituencies were contested, so that led to 500-over being eligible to vote. That was what I meant.

Mr Wong Kan Seng: Well, from the data I have here, 553 registered to vote before the 2006 GE and this is the data I have but Ms Lim may be right. There may be 1,000-odd that Ms Lim had mentioned. From what I am told now, we have 1,325 Singaporean overseas who are eligible to register to vote have registered.

Mr Viswa Sadasivan (Nominated Member): Could the Minister give his opinion as to whether there is a correlation between the number of people who have registered and the convenience or inconvenience factor in voting? In some countries, I gather that Singaporeans living abroad have to travel seven hours to

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get to a polling station. I am wondering whether a factor like this is keeping the number of people from registering even though they are interested to exercise their duty to vote? If so, is the Government doing enough to try and make it easier? I understand some of the limitations that the Minister has highlighted. They are reasonable. We need to make sure that we keep election fraud and other such issues at bay. But it is a question of balancing that with continuing to strive to make it easier for our overseas voters to cast their votes. I gather that countries like the United States of America do go out of their way to allow for their voters to cast their votes by mail. I am really wondering whether we would reconsider that because there are quite a few developed countries that do it.

Mr Wong Kan Seng: Sir, as I have said, postal or mail voting does not guarantee voters' secrecy. So as far as this is concerned, we do not think that that is the path we want to embark on. As to whether we have made it convenient for people to vote or not, and the accessibility of the voting stations, as I think that is the main point: we only set up voting stations overseas where we have a significant number of Singaporeans residing in those countries. We can only provide for that when voting takes place in the Embassy building for good reasons – safety, security as well as diplomatic immunity that we enjoy. We have 28 Missions where we have High Commissions or Embassies in capital cities of large countries, like America or Australia. In some places, we do provide for more than one station, like the US or China, but there is a limit to how far we can stretch and make accessible voting stations in the places where Singaporeans live. So right now, we have nine voting stations. In time, we may increase if there is a significant number residing in those places and if they are eligible to vote. But I think so far, we have tried our best and minimised the inconvenience to them by

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allowing Singaporeans to register online. When they move to another place or come back to Singapore, all they need to do is to go online and tell the Elections Department that they are in a particular place and the register will be updated again. When the register of electors is out for re-certification, that is another time for us to tell them again when to register. For those who have already registered it, is also quite simple. The Elections Department will inform them by email if they have maintained the same email address, that they are supposed to pre-register. All they need to do is simply declare that they meet the residential criteria.