Members of civic groups monitoring the May 14th general election gathered at the Office of the Election Commission (EC) on Wednesday to demand a speedy announcement of the poll results.
A letter, addressed to the EC chairman, demands that they announce the poll results as quickly as possible and explain the delay.
Yingcheep Atchanont of iLaw, one of the demonstrators, said that it has been a month since the election on May 14th and the recounting of votes at over 40 polling stations was completed on June 11th, therefore, there is no justification for the EC’s continued procrastination.
Although the EC has 60 days after the election to announce results, Yingcheep said that it is unnecessary for them to take such a long time, noting that, in the previous general elections, the EC took only 16 days to announce the 2005 election results, 29 days in 2007, 24 days in 2011 and 45 days in 2019.
The longer the delay, he claimed, the more the people will become suspicious and lose faith in the EC.
A political activist, Jatupat Boonpatraksa, said that a rally will be held at the Bangkok Art and Culture Centre on Friday, to put pressure on the EC and to block bad faith attempts to prevent the formation of a government by the eight coalition parties, led by the Move Forward party.
Patsaravalee Tanakitvibulpon also warned that many people may take to the streets if there is an attempt to block the formation of that government.
Meanwhile, it is reported that the poll results, which were submitted to the EC for approval by the EC’s secretariat on Tuesday, have been leaked on social media.
In the secretariat’s poll result report, all but 71 constituency MPs-elect were sent for approval by the EC, with the rest still pending investigation and are expected to be submitted to the EC next week, together with the 100 part-list MPs-elect.
Of the 71 constituency MPs-elect, 21 of them belong to the Bhumjaithai party, as well as Pheu Thai (17), Palang Pracharath (16), Move Forward (6), Democrat (3), United Thai Nation (3) Thai Sang Thai (2) and Pheu Thai Ruam Palang (1).
