As 'voter boom' dawns on GRS and BN, Upko cries 'Johnny come lately'

 

United Progressive Kinabalu Organisation (Upko) has chided several rival parties for questioning the effects of automatic voter registration on Sabah as polls are underway.

In a statement today, Upko secretary-general Nelson W Angang said his party has repeatedly raised the issue with the Election Commission (EC) on various occasions to no avail.

In contrast, Nelson alleged that several parties who are complaining about the dramatic increase in the number of voters in Sabah did nothing about it when they were part of the federal government.

"So, these leaders who are making noise now did not do their homework then and failed to highlight and address this issue.

"How can you claim to lead and champion Sabah rights when you lack prudence in foreseeing this problem?" said Nelson.

Recently, Parti Bersatu Sabah (PBS) information chief Joniston Bangkuai, Sabah Star president Jeffrey Kitingan and Sabah Progressive Party (Sapp) president Yong Teck Lee have all expressed concern over the voter list.

Sapp president Yong Teck Lee

According to Sabah’s first-quarter voter list in 2018, there were 1,159,484 voters.

The latest available list was for June this year, wherein there were 1,683,307 voters - a 45 percent increase.

However, some constituencies saw an increase in voters far above average such as Pensiangan (74.51 percent), Sepanggar (69.5 percent) and Kota Marudu (68.67 percent). (See chart below)

Yong alleged many of the voters added to the list were those who were illegally given Malaysian identity cards.

In view of this, Yong said a forensic audit of the Sabah voter list was necessary to remove those who are not eligible to vote.

Nelson said his party has been consistently raising Sabah's illegal identity card problem with the EC prior to the implementation of automatic voter registration.

He said Upko had demanded that the National Registration Department and EC remove dubious voters from the voter list.

"For Upko, it was a lonely battle in highlighting the issue of dubious citizenship.

“PBS, Star, PBRS and Sapp did not come forward then to show support and echo demand for the NRD and EC to ensure the automatic voter registration for those aged 18 and above for Sabah are genuine Malaysians.

"These parties were part of the federal government then and still are now," said Nelson. - Mkini