May 17, 2011
MEDIACORP'S reply last Friday ("MediaCorp explains why Aljunied result came after 2am") will surely assist voters and viewers alike to better appreciate or understand the constraints and limitations under which it covered GE2011.
But where the public is concerned, the question still remains unanswered.
If, as reported, Mr George Yeo himself was preparing to concede as early as 11pm, and his opponent, Mr Low Thia Khiang, too was already preparing to celebrate victory, what was it that stood in the way of an earlier public announcement of this crucial result by the Returning Officer?
One could reasonably expect the results of small constituencies with around 20,000 voters (like Whampoa and Yuhua) with clear-cut majorities to be among the first to be announced.
Admittedly, Aljunied is not in this smaller group, but the winning margin was convincing and unambiguous enough.
Why then the inordinate delay in making public the polling result of this particular constituency, which was so eagerly awaited by the people?
Hopefully, the official body supervising the election exercise will now offer its explanation to clear the air on the matter.
Narayana Narayana
[Looking at a pile of ballots after it has been sorted, a candidate can see which pile is higher, and which is lower, and you would be an unmitigated optimist to think that maybe the count will be in your favour when you consistently have the smaller pile. Except with very close counts (like in potong pasir) or with very mixed results (some wards going one way, and others going the other way), would an observer be unable to estimate the final result.
BUT the election process (counting) will have to continue. Surely we do not expect the RO to say, pursuant to my eyeballs, I hereby declare WP the winner of Aljunied, because any idiot can clearly see their pile of ballot papers is obviously higher than that of the PAP.
So the ballots still have to be counted to the very last ballot, the resulted checked and confirmed. And with so many votes to count, there may well be errors to correct, discrepancies to resolved, and finally results to be reported by each counting centre, confirmed and finally recorded and announced by the RO.
Delays happen for many reasons. Most are not for devious reasons. Did the delay caused the results to be different? Did the unduly long delay lead to intolerable excitement causing one or more over-anxious voter to have a heart attack and die?
Does Narayana Narayana (so nice, they named him twice) suspect foul play on the part of the PAP? How? Maybe they were so shocked the asked the RO to delay the announcement so that they have time to write their concession speech? Or maybe the WP asked for more time to write their victory speech. Or to bring more supporters to the assembly area. Or the police asked for a delay to allow them to deploy more officers for crowd control. Or maybe there was a technical problem or some sort or other (Maybe the RO needed to practice saying "Aljunied" properly).
In other words, what was the big deal? Does Nara-Nara write in to complain to the Academy Awards for awarding all the meaningless little titles for 150 minutes before announcing the best picture, best actor and best actress awards? What's his problem? He explained on May 11:]
From ST May 11:
MR NARAYANA NARAYANA: 'Sunday's article on the keen contest for Aljunied GRC ('From political gamble to election history') starts by recalling that Foreign Minister George Yeo called his wife Jennifer about 11pm on Polling Day and calmly told her: 'We have lost.' The report further informs that an hour later, his opponent, Mr Low Thia Khiang, was preparing for what would perhaps be the sweetest victory speech of his career. So, it must seem obvious that the Workers' Party had clinched the critical Aljunied constituency. But the hundreds of thousands of viewers who were not privy to such information sat glued to the designated TV channels awaiting the crucial outcome, which was not announced until after 2am, by which time I had decided to call it a night. A few minutes afterwards, I heard cheers in the neighbourhood and guessed, correctly, that the opposition had pulled off the near-impossible. Viewers deserve an explanation for the long delay (three hours) in what was arguably the most eagerly awaited result of the election. With the winning majority of over 12,000 votes, even a call for a recount was hardly likely to have changed the outcome. Don't viewers and voters need greater consideration in such supposedly 'live' and 'on-the-spot' coverage?'
[Well, I guess, if it's not important enough for you to stay awake, it's just not that important. You can check the news the next day. Or do you expect the RO at the next election to say, Pursuant to Mr Narayana Narayana bedtime which was set by his parents as to be no later than 2.00 am, and to all those supporters standing in the fields with poor cardiac health, and poor bladder control, I hereby declare... ?]
MEDIACORP'S reply last Friday ("MediaCorp explains why Aljunied result came after 2am") will surely assist voters and viewers alike to better appreciate or understand the constraints and limitations under which it covered GE2011.
But where the public is concerned, the question still remains unanswered.
If, as reported, Mr George Yeo himself was preparing to concede as early as 11pm, and his opponent, Mr Low Thia Khiang, too was already preparing to celebrate victory, what was it that stood in the way of an earlier public announcement of this crucial result by the Returning Officer?
One could reasonably expect the results of small constituencies with around 20,000 voters (like Whampoa and Yuhua) with clear-cut majorities to be among the first to be announced.
Admittedly, Aljunied is not in this smaller group, but the winning margin was convincing and unambiguous enough.
Why then the inordinate delay in making public the polling result of this particular constituency, which was so eagerly awaited by the people?
Hopefully, the official body supervising the election exercise will now offer its explanation to clear the air on the matter.
Narayana Narayana
[Looking at a pile of ballots after it has been sorted, a candidate can see which pile is higher, and which is lower, and you would be an unmitigated optimist to think that maybe the count will be in your favour when you consistently have the smaller pile. Except with very close counts (like in potong pasir) or with very mixed results (some wards going one way, and others going the other way), would an observer be unable to estimate the final result.
BUT the election process (counting) will have to continue. Surely we do not expect the RO to say, pursuant to my eyeballs, I hereby declare WP the winner of Aljunied, because any idiot can clearly see their pile of ballot papers is obviously higher than that of the PAP.
So the ballots still have to be counted to the very last ballot, the resulted checked and confirmed. And with so many votes to count, there may well be errors to correct, discrepancies to resolved, and finally results to be reported by each counting centre, confirmed and finally recorded and announced by the RO.
Delays happen for many reasons. Most are not for devious reasons. Did the delay caused the results to be different? Did the unduly long delay lead to intolerable excitement causing one or more over-anxious voter to have a heart attack and die?
Does Narayana Narayana (so nice, they named him twice) suspect foul play on the part of the PAP? How? Maybe they were so shocked the asked the RO to delay the announcement so that they have time to write their concession speech? Or maybe the WP asked for more time to write their victory speech. Or to bring more supporters to the assembly area. Or the police asked for a delay to allow them to deploy more officers for crowd control. Or maybe there was a technical problem or some sort or other (Maybe the RO needed to practice saying "Aljunied" properly).
In other words, what was the big deal? Does Nara-Nara write in to complain to the Academy Awards for awarding all the meaningless little titles for 150 minutes before announcing the best picture, best actor and best actress awards? What's his problem? He explained on May 11:]
From ST May 11:
MR NARAYANA NARAYANA: 'Sunday's article on the keen contest for Aljunied GRC ('From political gamble to election history') starts by recalling that Foreign Minister George Yeo called his wife Jennifer about 11pm on Polling Day and calmly told her: 'We have lost.' The report further informs that an hour later, his opponent, Mr Low Thia Khiang, was preparing for what would perhaps be the sweetest victory speech of his career. So, it must seem obvious that the Workers' Party had clinched the critical Aljunied constituency. But the hundreds of thousands of viewers who were not privy to such information sat glued to the designated TV channels awaiting the crucial outcome, which was not announced until after 2am, by which time I had decided to call it a night. A few minutes afterwards, I heard cheers in the neighbourhood and guessed, correctly, that the opposition had pulled off the near-impossible. Viewers deserve an explanation for the long delay (three hours) in what was arguably the most eagerly awaited result of the election. With the winning majority of over 12,000 votes, even a call for a recount was hardly likely to have changed the outcome. Don't viewers and voters need greater consideration in such supposedly 'live' and 'on-the-spot' coverage?'
[Well, I guess, if it's not important enough for you to stay awake, it's just not that important. You can check the news the next day. Or do you expect the RO at the next election to say, Pursuant to Mr Narayana Narayana bedtime which was set by his parents as to be no later than 2.00 am, and to all those supporters standing in the fields with poor cardiac health, and poor bladder control, I hereby declare... ?]
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