Hanging political posters and banners during the campaign period of the general election in Singapore must obey strict rules, according to a latest notice issued by the Elections Department.

The notice asked candidates in constituencies where there are contests between the ruling People's Action Party (PAP) and the opposition parties to get permits to display such material and submit the design and copies of each poster and flag to the Returning Officer in advance, said a Channel NewsAsia report on Saturday night

The Returning Officer's official stamp must be shown on each of the posters and banners which are hung publicly according to quotas.

Anyone who breaks the rules can be fined a maximum of 1,000 Singapore dollars (about 631 U.S. dollars) or jailed for one year, and the offending material will be removed and destroyed, according to the report.

As Polling Day on May 6 is approaching, candidates from both the PAP and the opposition parties, including the Workers's Party WP), the Singapore Democratic Alliance (SDA) and the Singapore Democratic Party, have been stepping up their campaigning activities.

On Saturday, several PAP candidates went on walkabouts and door- to-door visits to voters' homes, as well as conducting election rallies in their respective constituencies.

Some ministers who saw no contest in their own wards on Nomination Day on April 27 have been rendering help to their colleagues in contested constituencies, the report said.

The PAP led by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong secured 37 of the 84 parliamentary seats in seven uncontested Group Representation Constituencies (GRCs) on Nomination Day while the opposition parties have fielded 47 candidates in all the nine Single Member Constituencies and the other seven of the 14 GRCs to challenge the PAP.

However, it is for the first time since 1988 that the PAP did not win a majority of the total seats to declare victory in the general election on Nomination Day.

More than 1.22 million voters, including 553 overseas voters, are expected to cast their votes at 422 polling stations islandwide on May 6.

Singapore's last general election was held in November 2001, in which the PAP got 75 percent of the votes and won 82 out of the 84 parliamentary seats, while the WP and the SDA gained one seat each.

Source: Xinhua