Topic openers are not able to view results until they have voted themselves.
In some Circumstances the topic opener might not just want to vote himself, rather let others decide for him. But then he will not be able to view the progress/result. Same might probably even count for admins/mods
As an example: http://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=15&p=163889

Maybe the only thing needed would be an acp setting, to set an acl for (view results)

Cheers,
Ingo