SINGAPORE – Singaporeans are advised to head for their designated polling stations throughout the day on Friday, as there were long queues at some polling stations in the morning.
In an update on Friday, the Elections Department (ELD) said the queues have improved at most polling stations.
Long queues formed at polling stations islandwide before they opened at 8am.
There was a queue of about 100 at a polling station at the void deck of Block 307 Jurong East Street 32.
At Yangzheng Primary School in Serangoon, there were up to 60 voters in the queue as at 8.10am.
About 200 people were queueing at Kuo Chuan Presbyterian Secondary School at around 9am.
Other polling stations with long queues were in Toa Payoh and at Anderson Serangoon Junior College, Katong Community Centre and Block 533 Pasir Ris Drive 1.
Earlier on Friday, the ELD had advised voters to cast their votes in the afternoon, “when the queues are usually shorter”.
“We seek voters’ patience and understanding as we clear the morning queue,” it said then.
The Straits Times understands that e-registration was down at some polling stations, such as Kuo Chuan Presbyterian Secondary School, Block 9 Toh Yi Drive, and the Ministry of Education headquarters in Balestier.
The ELD said that technical issues with the e-registration system are progressively being resolved. It did not elaborate further.
Some voters said they had queued for at least 40 minutes and cited issues with the voter registration system.
One of them was Ms Chloe Woon, 38, who arrived at 8am at Yangzheng Primary School. Ms Woon, who works in communications, said she had to queue for about 40 minutes before being able to cast her vote.
She said election officials were directing the elderly to a separate queue.
At Katong Community Centre, a voter who wanted to be known as Madam Neo spent about 45 minutes at the polling station.
The housewife, who is in her 50s, said: “The machines took very long to scan my IC, and there was a long queue because there were only two machines.”
- Additional reporting by Anjali Raguraman, Shermaine Ang
