In the next general election, the Election Bureau will send more reminders to overseas voters, encouraging them to send back the ballots’ return envelope as soon as possible, and increase the chances of ballots being counted into the total number of votes. As long as the election officer receives the reply envelope before the voting day, even if the postmark is blurred or missing, it will still be included in the calculation.

my country has opened overseas mail voting for the first time since the 2023 presidential election. At that time, it was stipulated that overseas ballots must be sent to the election officer within 10 days after the voting date to complete the counting of all overseas ballots.

Education Minister Chen Zhensheng, who is in charge of public services, said in his written reply to Singapore's Forward Party Secretary-General and non-constituency MP Pan Qunqin on Monday (March 3) in Parliament that in the 2023 presidential election, about 60% of the mail-in ballots sent to the election officials on time were included in the counting of the votes, and the remaining 40% were rejected due to vague postmarks, unclear, missing or overdue postmarks.

According to my country's laws, the election officer must confirm that the return envelope was sent before the voting date, otherwise the relevant ballots will not be included in the counting of the vote.

Chen Zhensheng said that in the next general election, the Election Bureau will send more reminders to voters overseas, encouraging them to send back the ballots as soon as possible to send them to Singapore by the deadline to increase the chances of ballot counting in the total number of votes.

Further reading

6649 people registered as overseas voters to fulfill their citizenship obligations

6649 people registered as overseas voters to fulfill their citizenship obligations

Although overseas mail and voting in nursing homes are allowed, Chen Zhensheng: In-person voting is still the most transparent and safe

Although overseas mail and voting in nursing homes are allowed, Chen Zhensheng: In-person voting is still the most transparent and safe

He said that if the election officer receives a reply envelope before the voting day, even if the postmark is vague, unclear or missing, the ballot will still be included in the calculation, because such envelopes must have been sent before the voting day.

Chen Zhensheng said that for overseas mail voters in some countries, the local postal system usually does not postmark the return mail envelopes that are prepaid for the Election Bureau. Therefore, the Election Bureau recommends that overseas mail voters put stamps on their own to ensure that the return mail envelope can be stamped. The Election Bureau will send reminders to these mailing voters regularly during the election.

The Election Bureau will also continue to cooperate with Xin Postal Service and communicate with foreign postal operators to strive to postmark the return envelope even if the stamp is not posted.

As the constituency review committee was established on January 22 and revised on February 15, many people have set the end of April or May as the date when the general election is most likely to be held.