Tokyo municipal govt puts ballot boxes on wheels to facilitate early voting

KARATSU, Saga -- The municipal government has put ballot boxes on wheels to facilitate early voting ahead of the July 10 House of Councillors election in Japan.

Karatsu's election administration committee sent a light van loaded with polling booths and ballot boxes to three areas of the city on July 5. It introduced a van to make voting easier for citizens whose regular polling places have become more distant due to consolidation.

Local voters welcomed the new service, saying they were grateful to be able to vote so close to home.

The three locations that were visited by the voting van were a senior citizens' center and two community centers, all in the city's Hizen area, once an independent town before it was incorporated into Karatsu. Three of the three locations have been selected on a trial basis from among polling places that have been closed due to population decline or aging buildings, and are more than 3 kilometers from the new polling places.

A tent was put up in the facilities' parking lots and staffed with a receptionist, a voter registration checker, a person to distribute ballots, and a person to witness the voting process. The ballot boxes and the voting booths were set up in the back of the light van.

Megumi Ishida, 89, cast her ballot at the senior citizens' center, making her way there in her electric wheelchair beneath a cloudy sky brought by Typhoon Aere.

Even if it rains, I can come here from my house with a walking stick, she told the Mainichi Shimbun.

Noritaka Kitahara, the 70-year-old chief of Hizen's Hoshika district, drove his 92-year-old mother to the mobile polling station. He believes that the new service will increase voter turnout, and he hopes that it will continue.