Postal voting begins in Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Friday, 26 March 2010, 09:58 GMT]
Postal voting for the forthcoming general election began Thursday in all the twenty two electoral districts. Commissioner of Elections Dayananda Dissanayake has instructed the Returning Officers and Certifying Officers to ensure postal voting is completed in two days and the sealed packets of votes be handed over to the postal offices.

Meanwhile, Election Department has decided not to count the preferential votes of political parties and candidates of independent groups who poll less that five percent of the total polled in electoral district in the forthcoming general election.

Election Department officials said that the decision was taken to avoid unnecessary delay in releasing the results in time.

Candidates who do not stand a chance should not be present and cause congestion at the counting centres when they know that they cannot poll even five percent, he said.