DAP detects 234 clones in electoral roll

DAP today revealed one of its largest uncoverings of electoral discrepancies yet, with 234 voters having identical old identity card numbers.

These numbers are in pairs, with 117 of the voters matching their 'twins', despite having different names and new identity card numbers.

“Are these more data entry errors? Given that we are supposedly linked the with the National Registration Department (NRD), this shouldn't be happening,” said Petaling Jaya Utara MP Tony Pua.

With Pua was Rasah MP Anthony Loke and Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng, who is also Bagan MP, at the press conference held at the party's Kuala Lumpur headquarters this afternoon.

Of the 117 pairs, some are placed in the same state and parliamentary constituencies.

An example is Rohaila Zulkifli (New IC: 760808125490) and Norazwani Daud (New IC: 760918035234) sharing the same old IC, A3455269 and both are voters in the state constiuency of Batu Maung and parliamentary constituency of Bayan Baru, in Penang.

Pua questioned how the Election Commission (EC) could repeatedly attribute the discrepancies to human error as the EC is known for its strictness in registering voters.

“My assistant registar said registration of a voter will be rejected even if the religion is wrong, but these are huge errors... we are not talking about 10 or 100 of errors, we are talking about thousands of data entry problems,” he said.

'Postal votes could increase five-fold'

In addition to this, Loke, who is also DAP Youth chief, found that a voter by the name of Zaiazra Abdul Azis (IC: 811012085531) is listed in the EC database but does not exist in the NRD system.

He also found three other women voters, in Rembau, Rasah and Tampin respectively, who are registered as postal voters under their husband's military identification numbers but their husbands are not on the electoral roll.

“How can the wives of these army men be allowed to be postal voters when their husbands are not postal voters?” Loke asked.

He further lamented that there were cases of army men who have more than one wife being able to get all their spouses to register as postal voters.

“How many wives do they allow to register as postal voters? Is EC suggesting if the person has four wives, then all of them can be postal voters? Isn't it ridiculous? That means one army man has five postal votes,” he exclaimed.

Loke explained the new rule that allowed spouses of army men to register as postal voters was instituted by the EC last year.

“We are talking about doing away with postal voting and now EC is increasing the numbers of postal voters,” he said.

Pua called on the EC to impliment automatic voter registration to eliminate any more of such glaring “errors”.

“The EC has the administrative power to do it, but if it refuses, then of course we have to do it through laws in the Parliament,” he said.