Gerakan questions Malaysia’s “third world” way of voting

 

(Bernama) – “All these people may come back once in five years, not knowing what has been going on for the past five years, they just cast their votes and after voting, they go back to their homes in Petaling Jaya or Penang, leaving the local residents in limbo…why? Because when they cast their votes, they do not know the local scenario and let the local residents face all the problems all over again”

Gerakan wants the Election Commission (EC) to work closely with the National Registration Department (JPN) to re-register voters according to their residential address to prevent traffic congestion as well as to ensure local issues are prioritised in voting decisions.

“Why vote in Teluk Intan or Bagan Datoh when your addresses are in Kuala Lumpur?” the party’s acting president Datuk Chang Ko Youn asked, adding that voters travelling back to their hometowns just to cast their votes during elections would cause traffic congestion.

Further, the scenario is unfair to people in many constituencies since these “outsiders” do not understand the local political issues and may vote based on feelings influenced from what they read on the internet, he said.

“All these people may come back once in five years, not knowing what has been going on for the past five years, they just cast their votes and after voting, they go back to their homes in Petaling Jaya or Penang, leaving the local residents in limbo…why? Because when they cast their votes, they do not know the local scenario and let the local residents face all the problems all over again,” he told reporters after a Gerakan central committee meeting in Kuala Lumpur today.

He said by doing the re-registration exercise, the issue of phantom voters will surely diminish.

Chang also criticised the use of indelible ink as a primitive method used only in third world countries in Africa as their governments did not have a good system to register their citizens as voters.

“…but for Malaysia, we have good system under the JPN, we have all the data of the people, why not use the biometric system, just your thumb print, that’s the best way,” he said.

Asked whether there was a possibility for Gerakan to merge with MCA and SUPP to form one single party before the 14th general election, Chang said it was an old idea raised by MCA about 30 years ago.

He said the current political situation today might pave the way for that, but issues such as the constitutions of the parties would need to be resolved first.

“Gerakan is a multi-racial party and is open to Indians, Malays, Siamese…but some components of Barisan Nasional such as MCA need to change their party constitution as MCA is only for the Chinese people,” he said.

Chang admitted that unofficially there were talks about a merger among members but that was yet to be discussed among party leaders.