NEC: Election shows development of democracy in Cambodia

PHNOM PENH, Aug. 6 (Xinhua) -- The National Election Committee (NEC) announced that the July 27 parliamentary election showed good signs of progress in the development of democracy in Cambodia, the Mekong Times reported Wednesday.

The NEC said that although some problems were raised by political parties, the election has been positively assessed by national and international officials, of which the Cambodian people should be proud.

"Some political parties have said that one million people could not vote, and now they are appealing to citizens to protest against the election results. (But) during a final review of name lists in 2007, 585,723 names were deleted from the list, not one million." NEC was quoted as saying.

The reason for deleting those names was migration, death, duplication or loss of voting rights, it added.

NEC said that name deletion was conducted transparently and carefully and conformed with article 63 and 64 of the Election Law, which requires the NEC to circulate to commune councils the lists of names to be deleted so they can be displayed in order that citizens can review and make protests to political parities and observers with 80 days.

Editor: Mo Hong'e