The government wants to cancel the qualifications of young voters

Politics

Written by: Zheng Baosheng

2019-12-20 23:39

Legislative Council elections will be held next year and related rumors have begun to spread. The Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs, Nie Dequan and the Registration and Electoral Office, today (20th) clarified a rumor about the qualifications of voters.

About 70,000 verification letters have been issued since last week

There have been recent online rumors that a verification letter from the Registration and Electoral Office was received, questioning the government's desire to disqualify young people from registration and prevent them from voting in the 2020 Legislative Council election. Nie Dequan said that the allegations were fabricated out of thin air and were not true.

In fact, every year, the REO sends random verification letters to some voters to check whether their declared addresses are genuine. The latest issue was from December 13th, and about 70,000 verification letters have been issued so far.

The letter was sent out randomly, and it did not target the special age group.

If you receive the verification letter from the Registration and Electoral Office, you should reply as soon as possible, otherwise you will enter the next round of inquiry process, and if you do not respond, you will be disqualified. (Profile picture)

Reply as soon as you receive the verification letter

If you receive a verification letter from the Registration and Electoral Office, you should reply as soon as possible to confirm the address. If there is no reply before the deadline, the REO will carry out the next step before March 2020, and the statutory inquiry will be launched to the elector.

Voters included in the statutory inquiry must reply before May 2, 2020. If there is still no reply, they will be included in the deregistration list announced on June 1, 2020.

If voters are included in the de-registration list, they can still reply to the Registration and Electoral Office or make a claim before the legal deadline of June 25, 2020 to restore their eligibility, otherwise they will not be able to vote in the 2020 Legislative Council election.

The Registration and Electoral Office will also cooperate with other departments to check the information, including checking the registered address of multiple households to improve the accuracy of voter registration.

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