Special Voting • Special Voting introduced by the new Part XIVA is restricted to electoral officers and members of the “disciplined forces” responsible for performing security duties during elections. This refers to members of the Police and Defence Forces who will perform duties during elections. Note however, that in addition, persons who have been accredited as election observers will be eligible to apply for special voting. The applicants from these categories must demonstrate that they will be away from their constituencies on electoral duty and they will be able to vote in advance of an election at special polling stations set up at district centres (and, in some cases such as where districts are too large, district sub-centres) for the purpose by the Commission. • Voting at these special polling stations will be conducted over two days in order to minimise disruption to security duties. It will be subject to the same scrutiny by electoral officials, election agents and observers as voting at ordinary polling stations on polling days. A person must apply for a special vote with accompanying certifications from the applicant’s superiors or other persons as specified in the Bill. • Similar provisions relating to maintaining a list of persons granted authority to cast Special Votes and crossing out names of those persons from the voting roll sent to individual constituencies as we have observed above for postal voting apply in the case of special voting procedures too. The same point raised in respect of Section 77(3) and (4) regarding postal votes and the illogical sequence of those clauses applies to Section 81F (10) and (11) in that paragraph (11) should probably come before what is contained in paragraph (10) to make better sense. • The casting of an ordinary ballot by a person who has not been authorised to cast a special ballot is made an offence under the new section 81H (“Offences in relation to special votes”). • The special voting procedure, like postal voting, is too restrictive as it could easily be used to cover the elderly or persons who may be too ill or unwell to attend at polling stations during polling days. It is a fact that the long distances and limited means of transportation in rural 34