The Election Commission's (EC) explanations on Tuesday for the glitches during the 11 th general election has raised even more questions, several electoral observers said today.

EC chairperson Abdul Rashid Abdul Rahman had accused unnamed parties of trying to tarnish the commission's image by staging the alleged irregularities in the electoral process.

Despite blaming "irresponsible elements" for the more than 67,000 unreturned postal ballots, he did not name the suspects.

Institute of Malaysian and International Studies (Ikmas) deputy director Assoc Prof Dr Norani Othman, said Abdul Rashid's statements provided more than enough reason to hold an independent inquiry.

"There is insufficient information on the unreturned postal ballots, which the EC had used to target certain quarters.

"An independent inquiry is crucial to clear the air and prevent the same problems from popping up after each general election," she said when contacted.

EC's failure

Supporting MCA secretary-general Dr Ting Chew Peh's call on the EC to find out the facts instead of fending off allegations, Norani said an objective study was needed for this purpose.

"It is imperative for the government and the EC to address such issues promptly, convincingly and in a comprehensive manner."

Although the EC has seen through 10 general elections, it has failed to prevent the same problems from recurring over and over again, she added.

Votes of military and police personnel make up the postal ballots that are cast a few days before polling day.

Norani, who is Ikmas' Electoral Study Project Phase 2 co-ordinator, said it was unclear which part of the country the figure represents.

"The significance or insignificance of this revelation somewhat hinges on that. There is a need for full disclosure of the election report, including the categories."

She said the EC has so far only released bits and pieces of information together with some possible scenarios of how the alleged discrepancies could have occurred.

"There has always been the suspicion about postal votes going the way of the ruling party. Whatever it is, the discovery of ballots outside the box points to the irregularity in the conduct of the elections."

The EC chairperson also told a press conference yesterday that part of the reason for the unreturned postal ballots were because they arrived at the respective counting centres after the deadline.

Veiled threat

Sharaad Kuttan, director of the Ikmas study, said that even so, the EC should account for the late arrival and report accordingly.

"At the moment, we can't just say that there is an element of fraud because we don't have enough details," he said.

He described Abdul Rashid's emphasis on postal ballots as a veiled threat against the opposition.

"It's as if what the opposition revealed (about electoral discrepancies) were made up," he said.

EC secretary and election director Wan Ahmad Wan Omar (photo right) also reportedly said that the names of retired army personnel, still found on the postal electoral roll, was the only reason behind the unreturned postal ballots.

But Sharaad said: "I am perplexed as to how the names of retired personnel can still be found on the roll for postal ballots when they have re-registered as regular voters?"

He said the law required army and police officers to re-register as regular voters upon retiring from service.

"This is another opening for possible fraud. Why weren't their names removed from the list of postal voters upon retirement?"

The EC, he said, is responsible for ensuring that the electoral list is updated regularly, especially when "we all know that there are civil servants who retire every year".

"It points to the EC's inefficiency... a failure in the system," he added.

He said the EC's failure to rectify the breakdown in the electoral procedures may give credence to the Barisan Alternatif's idea to boycott the 11 th general election.

"This is also bad for our country as it defeats the purpose of having an election as part of a democratic system."

Transparency needed

Ong Kian Ming, a senior policy analyst at the Sedar Institute, a Gerakan think-tank, said the issue of unreturned postal ballots was not something new.

"But to put it in context, it is quite a large figure percentage-wise, especially when the whole chunk of 5,000 ballots were unreturned from the naval base in Lumut."

He said the EC needs to study the postal balloting procedure and make it more transparent.

"We need to know how postal balloting is conducted for the army, police and civil servants as well as Malaysians living abroad."

He also wondered if the short printing time between nomination and polling day - a total of eight days - had any bearing on the distribution of ballot papers.

"Maybe the new regulation allowing candidates to withdraw within three days after nomination has affected the distribution process."

Ong urged the EC to reveal the total number of unreturned ballots for the recently-concluded general election.

"The appearance of names on postal as well as regular electoral rolls is more of an administrative problem.

"The EC should clarify the procedures that retired army or police personnel go through when re-registering themselves as a regular voter.

"Do they need to change their identity cards from the military/police to a civilian one?" he asked.

Ong said recurring irregularities in the postal balloting process confirms the need for a transparent system where monitoring is done by representatives from all political parties.

At the end of the day, he said, it is the EC's competency in running the general election that is in question.