Nantou County police said Saturday three people are being investigated for apparently installing pinhole cameras outside a polling station in the county, where a legislative by-election was held on Saturday.
According to Nantou County Election Commission, the three people, who claimed to be members of a vote-watch alliance, showed up around noon and removed the cameras at polling station No. 38, according to the country election commission.
Similar recordings by the alliance were also reported at station No. 37, it said.
The commission said the three individuals were initially asked to leave, but later returned and kept recording inside the 30 meter exclusion zone around the polling station, which could constitute a violation of the Civil Servants Election And Recall Act.
Under the act, people who interrupt voting or try to affect voters’ decisions within the 30-meter zone can be sentenced to up to one year in jail or fined a maximum of NT$15,000 (US$488).
The police said they later intervened and took the three people and their recording equipment into custody.
However, one of the individuals told media that he is not affiliated with either candidate and the recording was made to ensure the election was conducted fairly.
He also noted that this is the first time he has been detained despite recording elections for three years.
There were also multiple similar violations reported on Saturday, with voters complaining about being recorded via cellphones or documented by people of unknown identity, the commission said.
The election is seen by political observers as a close battle between the Kuomintang’s (KMT’s) Lin Ming-chen (???), 72, who completed two terms as county magistrate in December, and Tsai Pei-hui (???), 51, who was the losing Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) candidate in the county’s magistrate election on Nov. 26 last year.
Tsai defeated Lin by a razor-thin difference of 1,925 votes in Saturday’s election.
Both Lin and Tsai condemned attempts to affect balloting, asking the police to investigate the matter, while Lin also accused the DPP of being behind some of the reported incidents.
Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel