losers of election

i like the ‘traveller’s tales’ section of the far eastern ecocnomic reveiw (FEER) magazine. the storries are very amusing… and they are real. the latest one featured rightly on the election seeing quite a number of countries in asia had just finished their election, including ours. in that particular column, FEER decided to talk on the losers rather than the winners, mentioning a few countries. for our country, it has this story to tell:

A Malaysian-Chinese reader told me a strange election tale from his country. A voter left his or her ballot paper blank except for the word “snake” written against a candidate’s name. The insulted candidate, hearing about this, argued that the legal requirement was for the voter to make “a mark” against the name of the candidate–and therefore claimed that paper as a vote in her favour. Ballot scrutineers pointed out that this would be the opposite of the voter’s intention. (And you thought the “hanging chad” debate in Florida was absurd.) It took an hour for the candidate to accept that the snake paper should be declared a spoilt vote.

as you have to be a member to read FEER online, i have the story up on my mentaljog extra.