Process is transparent and secured with safeguards, Teo Chee Hean tells forum
By
Jeremy Au Yong
THE Singapore electoral system came under scrutiny at a youth dialogue on Sunday, as participants quizzed Deputy Prime Minister Teo Chee Hean and other officials on the finer points of the process.
Questions from the floor
When Parliament has been dissolved, do all ministers including the Prime Minister maintain their public office status?
Deputy Parliamentary Counsel Owi Beng Ki: When Parliament is dissolved, all MPs vacate their seats. But the ministers do not step down from office.
Questions flew thick and fast, with many centred on the neutrality of civil servants who serve as election officials.
Responding, Mr Teo assured the 200 young people at the two-hour session that Singapore had a 'high integrity system'.
First, he stressed, the process of voting and vote-counting was transparent and secured with many safeguards.
'At every step, that system can be inspected by polling agents and counting agents of all the parties who take part in the elections,' he said.
This ability to inspect every step was the reason Singapore still did everything manually, and was not switching to electronic voting systems, he added.
Second, he said, the Government had gone to great lengths, including setting up the elected presidency, to ensure the integrity of the civil service.
He said: 'We ourselves put in place limitations on the Government to ensure that the Government cannot undermine the integrity of the public service.'
To top it off, he noted that the integrity of the system had not been challenged by other political parties.
Mr Teo was backed up on Sunday by three panellists: Elections Department head Lee Seng Lup; People's Association chief executive Tan Boon Huat, who had been involved in elections as an official since 1976; and Deputy Parliamentary Counsel Owi Beng Ki. Mrs Owi had been an adviser to returning officers in numerous elections.
