Clean up 200,000 dubious voters, Bersih tells PM

The prime minister must clean up the 200,000 dubious voters, discovered by Mimos Bhd, before the next general election, says Bersih 2.0's steering committee.

“The findings of Mimos Bhd further reinforce the need to clean up the electoral roll, which the Election Commission (EC) has failed to implement.

“These developments are unacceptable and both the EC and the parliamentary select committee on electoral reform (PSC) should immediately address these concerns,” members of the coalition for free and clean elections said in a joint statement today.

They were responding to Mimos’ revelations to the PSC on Tuesday, after an audit on the electoral roll.

Pressing the point home, the Bersih panel said that studying the 2008 general election results revealed the “shocking fact” that BN had won its simple majority through a margin of some 27,000 voters.

“This means some 27,000 voters were the ones who delivered to BN a simple majority government,” said the committee.

Sudden surges in voter numbers

The sudden surges in the numbers of voters in some areas of Selangor since the last general election, elaborated the committee, was another reason to clean up the electoral roll.

"For example, in Subang, there was a 35 percent increase from 84,000 to 114,000 registered voters, and in Kota Raja, the increase was 29.5 percent, while in Puchong, it was an increase of 25 percent from its 2008 figure.

"Many of these new increases in voters are transfers from other constituencies," Bersih 2.0 added.

The election watchdog also objected to the EC's decision not to use indelible ink for postal voters, which it claimed defeated the purpose of implementing the new measure.

"A key reason why there is a need to have the indelible ink is because there are many police and military personnel voters who are multiple-registered. Hence, the EC's exclusion of postal voters from the use of indelible ink is akin to undermining the measure to eliminate multiple voters."

The decision, it said, has cast doubts on the sincerity of the EC to carry out its task of holding clean and fair elections.

"It has also consistently put up blocks to electoral reforms by not fully addressing seven other demands of Bersih 2.0.

"For instance, its reluctance to accept overseas voters as legitimate voters, and not having a clear and transparent explanation on the process and criteria for advance voters and postal voters clearly shows the insincerity of the EC in ensuring electoral reforms are carried out," it added.

 

On another matter, Bersih 2.0 denounced the threat of police to arrest without warrant those who attended the Jan 9 "free Anwar" peaceful assembly, saying this was totally unnecessary, especially since the police had given prior approval for the assembly.

Those included in the threat of arrests are Bersih 2.0 chairperson Ambiga Sreenevasan and steering committee members Maria Chin Abdullah ( above ) and Wong Chin Huat, who was in Germany at that time.

"Bersih 2.0 stresses that there was no major incident, except for three bomb blasts, for which the police have not made any arrest till today.

“The priority is of the police is to carry out a full investigation against those who planted the bombs and not on civilians who were exercising their constitutional rights," the Bersih 2.0 committee added.

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