By Joanna Goh

The official fanclub of Rui En decided to donate S$1,120 to charity instead of putting the money on their idol who’s running for top honours in the online Star Awards 2013 polls

After months of fierce competition and relentless voting for the upcoming Star Awards 2013, Felicia Chin’s character (Du Siman from Don’t Stop Believin’) overtook Rui En (Hu Xiaoman from Unriddle 2) to clinch the top spot; both actress are running for nomination for next year’s Favourite Female Character award.

The official fanclub of Rui En, RBKD, could have dug deep into their pockets to push their idol back to her numero uno position in the Star Awards 2013 online polls. But instead of succumbing to “the system” and pumping money into what they term a “bottomless pit”, RBKD president Peh Xinyi shared with xinmsn that the fanclub have decided to donate S$1,120 to the Community Chest over the weekend. The lump sum of $1,000 could have bought them 10,000 votes, according to Xinyi.

Each voter can cast up to 10 free votes for each drama series at the online polls. Should a fan wish to bump their idol or favourite character further up the ranks, votes can be purchased from the Facebook app at an additional value of approximately S$10 (equivalent to 100 votes).

Over a phone interview with xinmsn, Xinyi shared her stance on the online polls and said, “At least the Top 10 phone polls take place once a year and that is fine. However, this time round the online polls take place continuously.

Viewers are allowed to vote their favourite drama characters into the polls during the drama’s telecast period and voting will end a week after the last episode is aired. The top 5 characters with the highest number of votes will be shortlisted for a final round of voting in the Star Awards 2013.

“The intention of the system is good as it empowers the viewers however some form of moderation needs to be enforced,” quipped Xinyi, who suggested that it might be feasible to introduce a cap on the votes in future, and added, “We’re not trying to go against it [the system] but we just feel that we have to take a stand and express our disappointment with it.”

It is understood that the fanclub has given their feedback. When xinmsn contacted Paul Chan, VP for Channel Branding & Promotions, he expressed that they have done a check on the statistics. “The total amount of free and earned votes cast so far is double that of purchased votes and you’ll really need a lot of fan support to be in the top 5.”

When xinmsn last spoke to Rui En at the imaging session for C.L.I.F. 2, the actress commented on the online voting saga between Felicity and RBKD.

The apologetic actress expressed, “I hope next year’s voting period will not be as long to better allow fans to concentrate on their studies. It will be better if it [voting period] was shortened.”

According to Channel 8’s most recent update, The top three actresses in the lead now are Rebecca Lim (Feng Luo Ling in Poetic Justice) with 44,098 votes, Felicia Chin (Du Si Man from Don’t Stop Believin’) with 40,441 votes and Rui En (Liu Yan Zhi from Poetic Justice) with 34,699 votes.

Source: Xinmsn

Categorised in C.L.I.F. 2 警徽天职 2, EN, RBKD, Star Awards, Star Awards 2013, Unriddle 2 最火搭档 2, xinmsn.