The Election Commission - an independent body tasked with the impartial management of free and fair elections - today claimed that it had never been partisan to the ruling Barisan Nasional coalition.

Commission chief Abdul Rashid Abdul Rahman told malaysiakini that the organisation had made efforts to be fair to all, both the ruling and opposition parties.

"We are independent. We don't support anyone. All political parties ... PAS, Umno and so on, are our clients. We have given them all avenues to raise their concerns. All we aim for is a clean and fair election," he said when contacted today.

Abdul Rashid also denied that the commission's recent action to send letters to both old and new registered voters to confirm their addresses was "to strip individuals of their voting rights" as claimed by opposition Muslim-based party PAS.

Yesterday, the local media reported that PAS had threatened to sue the commission for sending out such verification letters which they claimed to be an exercise to break their solid support in Kedah in the next general election, due before the end of next year.

Under fire

The commission had come under heavy fire from the opposition since they proposed several changes to the electoral process in the upcoming general election, which among others include the redrawing of constituency boundaries.

The controversial redelineation - which was said to favour BN - was eventually passed in Parliament in April despite a walkout by opposition members from the House.

Abdul Rashid also urged the opposition parties to stop politicising electoral issues in the press as their negative statements would only hurt the commission's image and credibility.

He added that it was unbecoming for the opposition to portray the commission as 'untrustworthy' and 'bias' when it had made a lot of efforts to promote a clean electoral process and had treated all political parties fairly.

"I believe we have done a lot of good. Other countries have seen our work and recognise our efforts ... I think we are one of the best."

Abdul Rashid also brushed aside the accusation that he is a member of the ruling Umno party.

"Since when have I become an Umno member? No, I am not an Umno supporter. That is untrue. In fact, some of my good friends are PAS members," he said.

'Phantom voters'

As to PAS' recent allegations relating to the verification letters sent to the voters, the EC chief explained that the commission had sent a total of 10,000 letters to old registered voters and another 300,000 to the new ones for the purpose of weeding out phantom voters from the electoral roll.

Voters who received such letters are given two weeks to respond to the commission. If they do not do so, the commission would take it as an indication that they are not residing in the address as stated in the electoral roll.

Abdul Rashid disagreed with PAS' contention that the exercise had infringed voters' rights, especially those old voters not affected by the new law.

Instead, he argued that letters were sent to only to those old voters with questionable status following complaints from the public and political parties.

He stressed that the EC was not trying to impose the new law on old registered voters under the current exercise.

Prior to the July 15 amendment to the Election Act, there was no regulation barring an individual from casting his vote in wherever he chooses to register himself.

"The old law stated registration is according to place of residence. It doesn't allow you to cheat. But people cheat (by planting voters to vote outside their place of residence) because the law is weak. It is wrong and manipulative to plant voters and, that is why the law was amended... to stop people from cheating," he said.

"You ask those in PAS whether this is right. They manipulated the law and plant voters. This is cheating ... it's not right."

However, he conceded that PAS is not the only political party that has resorted to such tactic, adding that most of the parties are involved.

Strong threat

Abdul Rashid also denied that most of the letters involving old registered voters were sent to PAS supporters in Kedah - a state in which the Islamic party is expected to pose a strong threat to the ruling BN in the coming general election.

"How could we have known that they are PAS supporters? They have no proof. We act on complaints - we don't know who they support, and we don't care. Besides... those letters were not only sent to Kedah but also to Kelantan, Selangor and Terengganu," he explained.

He claimed that PAS is making these baseless allegations against the commission "to vent their anger against the ruling party".

"These so-called religious people - their mind are full of ... prasangka (suspicions). Please don't be so suspicious. We are independent. We don't support anyone," he said.

He said instead of criticising the recent action of the commission, the opposition should instead contribute constructive ideas to help them clean the electoral roll of phantom voters.

Abdul Rashid said the problem of phantom voters could be due to political parties' different definitions of these voters.

"To some, phantom voters are ' nama ada, orang tak ada ' (non-existent voters)... but to us it also means planted voters where political parties arranged for outsiders to vote in certain areas so that they can win there. We want the electoral roll free of both types of phantom voters," he said.

Phantom or planted voters?

The contradictory definition of phantom voters came after Abdul Rashid himself claimed that an unnamed political party was involved in importing outsiders to cast votes at a particular area - which he said was among the reason why the BN candidate lost at the crucial Anak Bukit by-election in July last year.

However at that time, he classified such voters as 'imported voters' to which he now also referred as 'phantom voters'.

PAS, whose candidate won the by-election to deprive the ruling party its coveted two-thirds majority, denied any involvement of election malpractice.

As to the opposition's proposal to improve transparency in postal votes and the establishment of a caretaker government during the election campaign period, Abdul Rashid gave his reassurance that the commission would pursue such proposals.

Asked if the commission will continue to send verification letters to voters, Abdul Rashid said his organisation is committed to eliminate 'phantom voters' from the electoral roll.

"We will go to the ground and check 'one by one' the people who had failed to respond to the letters seeking confirmation their addresses stated on the electoral roll. It is an exhausting and tedious work. It will take a long time but this is what we have to do to."