Election War Drums

Sarawak State Elections

Everyone's talking about it. I think Sarawak will soon become the center of attention once the date for the State's 10th General Election is announced. As of now the attention of the people are mostly tuned to what's happening in the middle east and the Northern African continent which comprise of Tunisia, Egypt and Libya. However what will be happening in Sarawak will not be that exciting enough for NATO to come in. Why is that you may ask.....well I suppose its due to the fact that the State Elections in Sarawak has been orderly and peaceful. I am glad that most of the Sarawakians still civilised when it comes to using the power of the ballot boxes to do the talking.  

Thus it is indeed more of a joy for me to be involved in this upcoming State Election by accepting the Election Commission's appointment to be the Returning Officer for N.26 Bukit Begunan State constituency. There will be 71 of us for the 71 constituencies througout the state. Its a rather enormous challenge I know, as it will be my first try as a Returning Officer. Not that I am worried (as I have a good team of Assistant Returning Officers) but more on the blogging about the event. Thus I will need to find out what are my scope and limitations. But then, the experience itself is something worth sharing as it is an example of democracy at work. Another plus point is that the peace and tranquility that is unique in Sarawak which is something that did not make me think twice when accepting my appointment. Before moving to Sri Aman I was at most times the Presiding Officer for the Padungan State constituency and Bandar Kuching Parliamentary Elections. Now it seems that I will be taking care of the Presiding Officers in this part urban and part rural constituency.


As part of its preparation for the upcoming State Election, the Election Commission conducted a special briefing for the Returning Officers and Assistant Returning Officers at the Hilton on 21 Feb 2011


The N.26 Bukit Begunan team and the N.29 Batang Ai team


The officers in the State Election Machinery giving their pledge to ensure an orderly administration of the Election and to serve with Honour and Integrity


Follow up meetings with the State Election Commission's Director (on the right), YBhg Datu Haji Takun as he goes through the details of one constituency to another.

So back to the question - when is the State Election? Well, you can do your own guessing game. Listen to the war drums or read the blogs, news portals which is set to come up like mushrooms. Read about strange allegiance, kiss and make up stories and unexpected alliances, which I believe, will be the order of the day. Why strange? I don't know. I won't know. Politics is a totally different realm and is to be played by those who are certainly good at the game. So its best to leave it to the masters as they will huff and puff to try bring each other's house down. As long as the house of democracy is built on solid rock, which we as Returning Officers will be trying hard to represent and uphold, that's alright by me. We will do our best, that I can assure.

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