SEVEN NEW CONDITIONS INTRODUCED IN THE 13TH GE

The forthcoming 13th General Election (GE) will saw seven new ammendments in election procedures are to be introduced by the Election Commission (EC) of Malaysia in their effort to lift-up the quality of intregrity and transparency of this country's election proceedings.

EC Chairman Tan Sri Dato' Seri Haji Aziz Mohd Yusuf disclosed these conditions are actually from the original ten proposals initially proposed by the Parliament Reselection Commission (PRC) on 31st December 2011 however, after reviewing thoroughly through the proposals, EC approves only to seven with the remaining three rejected on ground they were no relevant.

"The first is the indelible ink, the second; the advance voting replacing postal-voting by the police, General Armed Forces (GOF) and Armies however, EC simply can't abolish all 100 per cent of the postal-voting as proposed because it the right of our citizens outside the country to vote and we can't just waived their rights by wiping their names out from voters' list because they can't be here on polling day."

Elaborating that those outside the country however needs to write an official application for them to exercise their rights to cast their votes by postal-voting to the Election Returning Officer (RO), Aziz also reveals that the RO on-duty have also the right to reject any of the postal-voting applications which might not in accordance with the stipulated condition.

"The third new conditions were to update and cleanse the voters registration list which I want to clarify here that EC had been doing all of the time all this while (but of course we don't make public announcement about it) and again, EC definitely can't erase the voters names without positively confirming that they are no longer exist or any other circumstances."

Aziz said this in his opening speech during the one-day EC's Meeting with all Political Party Leaders and Media of the Sarawak Chapter 2012 which was held at one of the leading hotel in the city here yesterday morning.

"Should however, in the events that any of the candidates' agents have a genuine suspicion on any of the voters during polling day, they can immediately raise the matter to EC together with any of the evidences on their claims so that prompt action can be taken," urged Aziz admitting that EC are also human too and possibly had overlooked a name or two.

Revealing forth conditions extension of the previous seven-days of displaying the of documents  related to the election proceedings to be doubled up to 14 days and the fifth condition; raising the transparency level in the polling room by allowing the candidates' agents to be or sit right in front of the room's entrance to monitor the entire procedures at first-hand.

"The six condition is to allow an OKU or a person have no ability moving on their own to be accompanied by person who has no relation at all with the voter compoared to the previous condition strictly stipulated that person must be a close relative to accompany any unable voters."

'The seventh and last condition is to ebolish the previous "objection period" and in addition once the candidate had registered his name to contest, there will be no turning back and although the candidate had pulled himself out from the contest, his or her name will be printed on the polling paper.

Aziz pointed out that is very important that those, particurlary from the political parties and those involved in the election who had attended the EC's Meeting yesterday to relay these information to their grassroots so that they would also fully undrestand the changes or amendments that had been made.

"Please, conduct a briefing to explain all these new conditions so that there would be no misundertandings or disputes on these new conditions on the polling day itself as it will cause dissatisfactions among the agents or supporters if they are not aware of these new conditions."

Aziz elaborated that apart from proposing ten major conditions, PRC had also proposed 22 other minor proposals relating to the election procedures which were recently submitted in their Final Report in March, this year and currently are being reviewed by EC before determining the decisions.

More than 100 participants, comprising from either the politicians from the government or the oppostion camps with representatives from the departments and agencies involved in the election and repsresentative from the media.

The Sarawak Chapter's meeting session was the second of its kind as the first was held on 19th July recently in Peninsular Malaysia the third and last meeting of the similar session, scheduled to be hold in Sabah on this forthcoming August 8th, next week.

Also present at the meeting were the EC Deputy Chairman Datuk Wira Haji Wan Ahmad Wan Omar, Sarawak EC Chairman Datuk Haji Takun Sunggah and other distinguished guests.

-UnReportedNews™®