The advance voting registration website went down for several hours on Sunday night (9 April) ahead of the midnight registration deadline, leading to calls for the Election Commission to extend the registration dates.

The online advance and overseas voting registration form.

iLaw reported that the website used by the Election Commission of Thailand for advance and overseas registration voting went down at around 21.00 on Sunday night (9 April), the last day of registration for advance and overseas voting for the upcoming general election.

Users reported that they either could not access the website or could not submit their registration form. The site became accessible again 10 minutes before the midnight deadline.

iLaw said that the interruption could mean that a large number of people will not be able to vote, as they may not have been able to register to vote early, overseas, or outside of their constituency.

iLaw also noted that the Election Commission regulations stated that advance voting registration must take place at least 30 days before the election date, making 14 April the final date for registration. It is therefore possible for the Election Commission to extend the registration deadline for people who were not able to register online due to the website being inaccessible.

Over 2,100,000 people had registered to vote early, overseas, or outside of their constituency by 17.00 on Sunday, 500,000 of whom registered yesterday.

Former MP and Move Forward Party spokesperson Rangsiman Rome said on Monday (10 April) that it is the duty of the Election Commission and the Ministry of the Interior to make sure that the website functions throughout the registration period, and that the Election Commission should have already foreseen that the website would experience a large amount of traffic.

Rangsiman called on the Election Commission to extend the registration period to make sure that people who could not register to vote are able to do so, which is something that is already in the Election Commission is allowed to do.

Sawang Boonmee, Secretary-General of the Election Commission, told reporters at a seminar on Monday (10 April) that the Election Commission has already been made aware of the interruption, and that it is likely because the traffic was too large for the server, which was built to allow access to 4000 people per second.

Sawang said that the Election Commission apologises for what took place and will take responsibility. He said that the Bureau of Registration may be contacting anyone who was able to get onto the site but could not register to vote to ask them where they would like to vote, but that they are not currently considering extending the registration period.

The registration period for advance and overseas voting was 25 March – 9 April. Anyone who registers to vote early, overseas, or outside of their constituency will go to the polls on 7 May, a week ahead of the election date on 14 May.