NG KANG-CHUNG KC.NG@SCMP.COM
PUBLISHED : Tuesday, 25 August, 2015, 4:56pm
UPDATED : Tuesday, 25 August, 2015, 5:28pm
Voters were found to have registered addresses that do not exist. Photo: Oliver Tsang
Two pan-democratic parties today lodged further complaints with the election watchdog about the records of more than 400 voters with suspicious or false residential addresses, warning that they were “the tip of the iceberg”.
The cases reported by the Labour Party and Civic Party to the Registration and Electoral Office follow similar complaints by the Democratic Party and Civic Party last week, including that unknown people had used residents’ home addresses to register for voting in November’s district council elections.
In some of the new cases, voters were found to have registered addresses that do not exist. Other cases saw seven or eight voters registered as living in the same 300sqm flat.
Mak Tak-ching of the Labour Party said such irregularities were spotted in constituencies in Tsuen Wan, Hung Hom and other districts, involving some 300 voters.
“We believe it is only the tip of the iceberg. The electoral office should take it seriously and proactively launch an investigation,” he said.
Civic Party lawmaker Claudia Mo Mo-ching, whose party also reported 29 suspicious cases in Mei Foo Sun Chuen, warned that the irregularities could erode people’s confidence in the election system.
Today is the last day for voters to check and update their particulars in order to vote in the upcoming district council elections. Voters should report any change in their details to the office.
A spokesman for the office said it would look into the complaints.
The South China Morning Post has previously reported on voters claiming they live in hotel rooms that no longer exist, the Cultural Centre in Tsim Sha Tsui and three parks.
A person who gives false or misleading information for voter registration faces up to six months in jail and a HK$5,000 fine. Scores of people were convicted of registering false addresses to vote in a constituency they did not belong to in 2011.
http://m.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/1852448/400-more-suspicious-hong-kong-voter-records-tip-iceberg-pan
