A police officer oversees the delivery of ballot boxes Photo: Fiji Election Office
The 2022 Fijian General Election began on Monday with 77,907 citizens able to cast their votes at 613 pre-polling venues this week.
Thousands of Fijians voted on day one of pre-polling across 149 venues. Voting then continues at another 149 venues on Tuesday and so on until pre-polling has been completed by Friday.
Supervisor of Elections Mohammed Saneem said an electronic dashboard has been set up to allow tracking of the pre-polling process.
According to the dashboard 7,487 people voted yesterday - 41 percent of eligible voters for day one of pre-polling.
The Fiji Election Office's dashboard Photo: Fiji Election Office
Saneem said information about polling stations has been made available through the media.
"The schedules have been published widely in the newspapers and given to all political parties and independent candidates. Any person who wishes to find out the venues will be able to do so on the dashboard.
"The report from the dashboard will continue to take place and be updated, it will be live 24/7, and you can access that information from the Fijian Elections Office website," explained Saneem.
The Fijian Broadcasting Corporation reports that 67-year-old Vilomena Likumoto was the first to vote at the Nasele village hall in Naitasiri on Viti Levu.
Likumoto said she has never missed an opportunity to cast her vote in an election.
She explained that voting was an important avenue to ensure people's voices were heard.
Thirty-two multinational observers are on the ground assessing and witnessing the operation of pre-polling.
Pre-polling will be completed on Friday.
Voting items being delivered Photo: Fiji Election Office
Fiji's Military says it will respect the democratic process
The Republic of Fiji Military Forces Army Commander, Brigadier General Jone Kalouniwai, stressed that the election outcomes will be respected.
"It is the time for them (the Military) to honour the democratic process by respecting the outcome of the votes."
Fiji Village reports Brigadier General Kalouniwai told the soldiers that they must keep in perspective their constitutional mandate that, regardless of the outcome, democracy is alive.
Meanwhile, the Fijian Elections Office is training staff for the Results Centre for the election.
The five-day long training is held by the Development Services and the Information and Technology staff of the elections office.
Election day itself is on December 14.