14 Jul 2012

Voting for PNG 2012 general election officially ends

8:32 am on 14 July 2012

The voting for the 2012 National Elections in Papua New Guinea has officially ended.

The Electoral Commissioner, Andrew Trawen says the last votes were cast on the Bougainville Atolls and the Daulo open electorate in the Eastern Highlands Province yesterday afternoon.

He says they are into counting now and he is confident that process will be completed on schedule.

Mr Trawen also confirmed the declaration of Don Polye as winner of the Kandep Open electorate seat in Enga Province.

He says this brings to four the number of seats declared so far, two of which are re-elected and two newly elected members of parliament.

Don Polye polled 23 952 votes, his closest rival was Luke Alfred Manase with 11,418 votes.

The others are; Manus Open - Ronny Knight, Manus Regional - Charlie Benjamin and care taker Prime Minister, Peter O'Neil for the Ialibu/Pangia open seat.

Mr Trawen reiterated an earlier message to his provincial election managers to perform their duties as required with a view to making the counting stage of this election as smooth and transparent as possible.