Keep ballot counts at polling stations, civil groups urge

Six civil society organisations have urged Minister for Justice Filimoni Vosarogo not to bring into force a new law allowing uncounted ballot boxes to be moved from polling stations to counting centres, warning that it could open the door to ballot tampering.

The Centre for Democracy and Dialogue, Fiji Women’s Rights Movement, Fiji Council of Social Services, Transparency and Integrity Fiji, SEEP and femLINKpacific said the Electoral (Amendment) (No. 2) Act 2026 was passed by Parliament last Friday.

The amendment adds section 89A to the Electoral Act 2014, allowing the Electoral Commission to approve vote counting at one or more centres instead of polling stations.

The groups said the law did not specify how ballot boxes should be transported, who should accompany them or how party agents and observers could verify that they had not been tampered with.

In the 2014, 2018 and 2022 elections, votes were counted at polling stations in the presence of party agents and observers. Copies of the results were then displayed outside for public inspection.

The groups said this year’s election would have 2,149 polling stations, each with no more than 650 voters.

They said the Electoral Commission had acknowledged in April that most counts in previous elections were completed within four hours.

“The best protection against electoral manipulation is a system that leaves as little room for manipulation as possible,” the groups said.

The organisations also called on the Electoral Commission to clarify whether it intended to use the new provision in this election.

Government response

In response, Mr Vosarogo said yesterday that the law had already been passed.

He said the amendment was intended to give the Electoral Commission and the Supervisor of Elections “flexibility” if the election and referendum were held together, which he said was a strong possibility.

Fiji Law Society

Fiji Law Society president Graham Leung raised separate concerns about changes to section 115 of the same Act.

He said the amendments extended restrictions on civil society organisations and sought to prevent courts from reviewing certain Electoral Commission decisions.

“The right to challenge unlawful administrative action is an important safeguard against the arbitrary exercise of public power. Any weakening of that right is a concern,” Mr Leung said.