Volunteer movement brings home over 3,000 postal votes

 

STATE POLLS | VoteMalaysia today said it has brought back a total of 3,495 ballot papers from overseas postal voters for the six state elections.

Its coordinator Diffan Sina said this amounted to 43.8 percent of the 7,972 postal voters who have registered with the Electoral Commission.

The ballots were hand-carried by the movement’s volunteers on passenger flights from across the globe.

Subsequently, the ballots were then arranged at the Kuala Lumpur and Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall (KLSCAH) before being dispatched to 245 state seats and one parliamentary seat.

Diffan also said that Selangor recorded the highest number of postal votes, with a total of 1,887 papers, while Terengganu had the lowest count, with just 60 papers.

Just in time

“Thanks to the movement’s volunteers around the world, we were able to bring home the papers just in time before polling day tomorrow.

“The ballots will then be sent to their respective states by 5pm today, starting with Kelantan and Terengganu,” Diffan told the media at the KLSCAH today.

Additionally, one of the movement’s collaborators, 1Third Media, stated that nearly 20 percent (1,511) of the ballots came from Singapore.

The VoteMalaysia movement was set up in September last year by Undi18 in response to shortcomings in the EC’s postal voting system during the 2018 general election as well as the Johor state election last year.

During the (GE15), the movement succeeded in delivering 35,092 postal ballots, which amounted to 73 percent of all those registered to vote overseas during the election last November.

‘Fix the system’

Meanwhile, Undi18 advocacy director Tharma Pillai renewed calls for the EC to reform its postal voting system.

He said that among the issues that overseas voters have dealt with included receiving their ballot papers the day before or after polling day.

He reiterated that if the EC’s system had improved to better serve overseas Malaysians, VoteMalaysia would have ceased its operations after GE15.

“We should not have to do this again.

“The EC has remained tight-lipped against the suggestions of improvement that we and even many Malaysias both in the country and overseas have given them.

“I call for the government to also do something to fix the system… democracy should be accessible and flexible for all Malaysians,” Tharma said.

He also expressed gratitude to KLSCAH for offering its venue as a makeshift sorting centre once again, recalling that it had hosted the movement during GE15 as well. - Mkini