By Thai Newsroom Reporters
ALL 200 SENATORS-DESIGNATE will not be officially ratified until all formal petitions of alleged electoral riggings and other irregularities have been taken into account by the Election Commission, according to Election Commission Chair Itthiporn Boonprakhong.
The chief commissioner declined to elaborate as to how long it could probably take his colleagues to finish handling those complaints earlier filed against many winning candidates by defeated ones and said no senators-designate will be yet ratified as otherwise scheduled for today (July 3).
The Election Commission chair also declined to say how many of the winning contestants could possibly be denied the senatorial status for having evidently breached the election law and relevant rules as accused by their defeated rivals.
Itthiporn did not either confirm or deny speculation that the ratification of the total 200 senators-designate and 100 others in reserve would be officially announced by the polling agency next week.
Election Commission secretary-general Sawaeng Boonmee has earlier said the official ratification of all the senators-designate might probably be announced first whilst some could possibly be suspended by court from doing their legislative duties at a later date if evidently found to have violated the election law.
The allegations of vote-riggings and other electoral wrongdoings primarily involve a number of unidentified “puppet” contestants who had been arranged by unnamed wheeler-dealers allegedly connected with the Bhumjaithai under de facto party boss Newin Chidchob to pick a list of fellow candidates specified on pads of paper handed to them at hotels prior to last Wednesday’s national or final stage of the senatorial election.
Other allegations refer to purposely false claims made by winning candidates of professions with which they have not truthfully earned regular incomes.
The polling agency is legally provided a one-year period after the national-tiered election date to conduct fact-finding investigations into those allegations and finally deny the senatorial status of those who may have evidently breached the election law and relevant rules.
CAPTIONS:
Top: Election Commission logo overlaid on parliament meeting chamber.
Front Page: Representative image of voting in an election with the Election Commission logo at top right. Both photos: Thai Rath
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