By Kreetika Kumar, Multimedia Journalist, FBC News – 16 November 2022

kkumar@fbc.com.fj | @KreetikaFBCNews

The Fijian Elections Office has started ballot paper printing.

Supervisor of Elections, Mohammed Saneem, says the contract for the printing has been awarded to Star Printery, based in Raiwai.

According to Saneem, the facility is now under a 24-hour heavy police guard.

He adds according to Section 38[1] of the Electoral Act, the FEO is required to implement adequate security features into the design and production of the ballot paper.

“I can assure you that it is going to be difficult for anyone who wants to duplicate it or even photocopy it. In these elections, we do not require our staff to authenticate a ballot paper with a signature or stamp simply because, right from production, the ballot paper has security features built into it.”

Saneem earlier highlighted that they will be printing 668, 200 ballot papers for Election Day, 106 300 papers for Pre-poll and 30,000 ballot papers for Postal.

The total number of voters on Election Day and Pre-poll will be finalized after Postal Applications close.

In the 2018 General Election, the Fijian Elections Office printed a total of 764,850 ballot papers.