Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak must respond immediately to the crisis of confidence in the Electoral Commission (EC) by setting up a royal commission to study and propose electoral reforms, the Penang DAP says.

"Any move by Najib to call for polls in the current state of crisis of confidence in the sanctity of our elections will be unethical and ungentlemanly," state DAP chairman Chow Kon Yeow said today.

NONE The government, Chow ( left ) said, must also suspend any plan for the biometric verification of voters until all outstanding controversies are resolved.

This was necessary as the July 9 Bersih 2.0 rally demonstrated the people's lack of confidence in the nation's electoral process and the commission overseeing it.

"Other than the repeated chest-thumping by Najib... there has been zero indication that the government is indeed serious about responding to the concerns regarding our electoral system," added Chow, who is the MP for Tanjong.

Worse still, he said, opposition parties and independent online media have in the last few weeks exposed what appeared to be "gross inconsistencies in the electoral roll".

He pointed to the "numerous cases" that have been highlighted in recent weeks, including murky phenomenon such as the infamous " Mismah-gate " and incidents of " cloned voters ".

‘Something fishy in the EC'

"I would seriously like to give the EC and National Registration Department (NRD) the benefit of doubt and believe that this is all just a chronic case of utter incompetence.

"But the lack of response from the government - save for covert "corrections" made almost immediately on the NRD's online database - gives valid reason for Malaysians to suspect that something fishy is going on," said Chow, who is also the assemblyperson for Padang Kota.

The same unhelpful answer given by the EC, that non-citizens cannot be registered as voters, was not enough.

"Are PR-holders being given citizenship so they can be voters in GE13? To dispel such suspicions, it is best the home minister shows us statistics on the numbers of people made citizens in the last 10 years," Chow said.

He also demanded that the EC and the NRD put on record the number of new citizens that have been made voters in the last 10 years.

"Has there been a deviation in the trend, especially in the last three years, post-GE12 of 2008?" he asked.