With the 14th general elections around the corner, lots of Malaysians are rushing to register as voters before the end of this month. In the midst of all this, some alarming news about voter registration has surfaced.
Earlier this week, a recent Facebook post garnered a lot of attention from Malaysian netizens.
Source: Facebook
The Facebook user, Elaine, expressed her anger and concern over a letter her boyfriend received, stating that his registration as a voter was rejected by someone.
The letter he received instructed him to report to an election office in PKNS, Shah Alam. The letter stated the reason behind his rejection was that he was a “pemilih diragui” (suspicious voter), according to the Malay Mail.
Source: Malay Mail
When they reached the office, they were shocked to find many other Malaysian Chinese there. After talking to a few of them, Elaine realised that they all received the same letter as her boyfriend.
Source: Facebook
They ended up waiting for about 3 hours at the office for a 5 minute-long meeting with an Election Commission (EC) officer to approve her boyfriend’s registration as a voter.
Elaine stated that she wasn’t sure of the location of the person who objected to her boyfriend’s registration. She also said that most of the people whose registration was initially rejected were approved by EC officers after they found insufficient evidence proving that they were “suspicious voters”.
“I was so angry about [the incident] so I decided to share this on Facebook. I know a lot of people are getting objected.”
It was reported that head of Bersih 2.0, Maria Chin Abdullah, has received many complaints from people concerning this matter.
Source: The Star
At a press conference held by Bersih 2.0 earlier today (8th March), the organisation alleged that there are certain quarters that are trying to prevent citizens from registering as voters for the 14th general election, reported Malaysia Today.
It was stated at the press conference, that a provision in the Elections Regulations 2002 that allows objections against newly registered voters, is being exploited by certain agencies.
“The objection provision in the regulations is in place to weed out phantom voters,” stated Maria Chin.
“But unfortunately, the recent trend in objections may give rise to a misperception that there is a conscious effort to block new voters from registering.”
Source: freemalaysiatoday.com
“…this is not the first time we encountered this issue. As far as we know, it has been going on for two years.
“The same issue was raised by DAP MP Ong Kian Ming in 2015 and we had also received similar complaints that year.”
This surfaced just after the recent news that Malaysians have to register to vote by the 31st of March 2017 due to recent speculations that the upcoming general election may be this September.
So, if you haven’t already, remember to register as a voter before the end of this month, everyone!
Also read: Malaysians NEED To Register Themselves As Voters Before 31st March 2017
