Page 218 - kpi377

permission to use her school as a polling station in the Senate elections; they aliso wanted her

to provide two Qf her teachers to help with the work in that station. That confused her because
she thought that organizing the senatorial elections was the task of the ECT and the PEC
Thus. she wondered what a local government may have to do with this. Originally. looking for
suitable polling stations and for people willing to work on the respective committees was.
indeed. a task earmarked for the PECs. But when the final regulation was issued by the ECT.
it suddenly appeared that both the chief district officers and the municipalities would do this

work. After completing this work. they will have to submit their suggestions to the PEC for
approval. Many PEC-members were quite miffed because they had already spent a lot of time
doing those things themselves. They also suspected that neither the chief district officers nor
the municipalities would attach much importance to this work but rather chose the usual way
of asking the village headmen and the subdistrict headmen or schools to look for available
space to set up polling stations. Consequently. the PEC would have to carefully check and
personally inspect every suggested polling station anyway. Recall that excluding certain groups
of civil servants and local headmen from the election administration was one of the reasons
for establishing the ECT and the PEC in the first place. So. why bring them back through the

rear entrance?

The ECT's permanent organization ~nds at the provincial level-that is. with the
PECs and their offices. Temporary positions. such as the constituency directors. or temporary
bodies. such as the counstituency committees. will exist only during elections to the House of
Representatives (the organization of senatorial elections is slightly different since. in this case.

the entire province is the constituency). Prospective candidates have already been selected by
the PECIECT in numbers exceeding the available positions. In Thai. these candidates are
called 11~ n.n.(;1. t'U(;1 and 11~ r.lfl.n.n.(;1.t'U(;1. They already underwent an initial training by
using the manuals prepared to guide them in their work. Around election time. the numbers
will be reduced according to the positions available. and the appointed people will be in office
for approx. 60 days. Unit! then. the prospective candidates will meet from time to time in
order to familiarize themselves both with their work and their constituencies.

Directors' and committees' duties are plentiful. The committees are responsible for
organizing many aspects of the elections. such as determining the polling stations. preparing
the voter lists. or supervising the voting. Constituency directors are the ones who accept
candidates wanting to run in the MP elections; that is. candidates would no longer register at
the provincial hall as was done previously. They also supervise the constituency office and
appoint assistants. Of course. all this is done by cooperation not only with the PEC but also

with government agencies. Directors. at least. are supposed to work full-time during elections;
committee members may have to invest a little less time. In any case. since by far most of the
candidates for the director position and the membership on the committees are permanent
civil servants (many are school teachers). the question arises whether their superiors will be