Supervisor of Elections Mohammad Saneem

More females voted in the 2018 General Election.

This has been revealed in the 2018 General Election Voter Turnout and Survey Report which was released today by the Fijian Election Office.

Supervisor of Elections Mohammad Saneem says even though 307,079 males registered to vote only 220,016 cast their vote.

Saneem says 223,439 females cast their votes while the registered number was 304,571.

The Supervisor of Election says these should indicate women feel safe going to polling centers to cast their votes.

“In our case with the greater turn out of females we can conclude that the election environment was safe and secure for females to come out and vote and if you use the democracy example than the females having to turn up in greater number and having voted in the election would mean that they have a greater confidence in our democracy.”

Saneem says a total of 14,137 Fijians were surveyed following the General Election.

These include those that voted and those who did not vote.

He adds when these Fijians were asked how often they were following the campaign of candidates, the most opted to say not much.

When asked how much interest do they take in politics, very few of them say they have a lot of interest in politics.

Saneem says in theory this should indicate that political parties and politicians need to re-look at how they campaign and attract voters.

“This should be an indication to stakeholders on how they need to review their political activities so as to encourage voter turnout and not to discouraged it.”

The survey report also revealed that more people were not fully following the campaign of candidates.

The Supervisor of Election has also stated misinformation on social media played a big role in voters’ decisions on polling day.

The report can be obtained on the online portal of the FEO.