Go North EC tells EU

The Elections Commissioner Dayananda Dissanayake has requested the European Union Election Observers to be detailed specially in the North-East in an effort to discourage organised election rigging, a spokesman for the Elections Commissioner's Department said.

The spokesman said the Elections Commissioner had also decided to assign Grama Niladaries in polling stations to avoid voter impersonation.

Assistant Returning Officers will also be appointed to cluster polling stations, which will be set up 500 meters inside the government controlled areas in order to enable voters residing in LTTE controlled areas to exercise the universal franchise.

Transport facilities for the voters to polling stations and back into LTTE controlled areas will be arranged by the Assistant Government Agents and Grama Niladaries.

The EU will have 22 long term observers and 44 short term observers who will monitor the election on the polling day.

Meanwhile, postal voting of the Presidential election will take place on November 7 and 8. There are 323,428 public servants eligible for postal voting plus 24,724 displaced voters.

According to the Elections Commissioner's Department, the total number of registered voters for the forthcoming Presidential elections is 13,327,160.

There will be 10,486 polling stations islandwide and 710 counting centres.