Postal vote fiasco

For some strange reason, the Election Commission has always had this strange ruling in the Election Regulations (Electoral Roll) 2002 and Election Regulations (Postal Votes) 2003 - that only these categories of Malaysians qualify to be postal voters:

• military personnel
• students
• staff of embassies and high commissions, and their spouses

In an article in The Star on 17 Feb 2008, EC secretary Kamaruzaman said: “The law does not provide for ordinary citizens living abroad to cast postal votes. Under the Election Regulations (Electoral Roll) 2002 and Election Regulations (Postal Votes) 2003, only three categories of citizens living overseas are allowed to cast postal votes. Individuals who are keen to vote must come back to Malaysia as there is no other alternative for them to exercise their rights." (http://bersih.org/?p=1008)

With this ruling, it looks like Malaysians who work or live abroad don't qualify unless they're students.

Many overseas students have in the last three months or so have tried to enquire at Malaysian high commissions about their right to vote and the possibility of registering as postal voters. However, none of the responses to their queries have been satisfactory:

• Many have been told they can't, even though the Election Act say they can.
• Many have been told only government scholars are allowed to register as postal voters. (Hmm... I wonder why?)
• High commission staff have no idea what the students are talking about.
• High commission staff tell students to register via the MSD of the universities.
• Students have been discouraged from registering, with staff members asking them not to waste their time voting.

Meanwhile, this article in The Star dated 12 Jan 2008 (http://bersih.org/?p=880) clearly states that Malaysians working in China were encouraged to register as postal voters.

So when I saw an article in NST on 26 Feb 2008 titled "One more day to register as postal voters", I immediately posted the article to friends who I knew were studying abroad as well as in my Facebook groups such as:

• Deny Barisan Nasional a 2/3 Majority in the upcoming General Election
• WCI2
• DAP 12th General Election Campaign
• Vote for a change Malaysia
• E-Democratic Action Party
• VotED
• Free and Fair

My friend Tirath who is studying in Melbourne then quickly sprung into action and somehow managed to alert up to 50 other Malaysian students there to turn up at Malaysia Hall yesterday (27 Feb 2008) and register as postal voters.

They were told that their forms were successfully faxed to the High Comm in Canberra, who will in turn fax them to EC in Malaysia. Hard copies will be couriered to Malaysia today (28 Feb 2008).

Malaysia Hall also said that the High Comm is working later than usual yesterday to fax the forms to Malaysia but Tirath could not confirm that as the High Comm doesn't answer the public phone lines after hours. In theory, EC Malaysia should have started to receive faxed copies of the students' Borang A from Melbourne by around 4.30pm.

Tirath called the EC hotline (03-88856600) to let them know they can expect to receive a lot of Borang A from Australia soon - but the guy didn't sound like he understood what Tirath was going on about.

What was interesting was that no one checked the students' ID to verify they were indeed students. As long as they had ICs and their names were on the electoral roll, they were allowed to register.

The EC had better be prepared for the assault that's gonna be levelled at them once GE2008 is over!!!

Links:
http://thesilo.wordpress.com/2008/02/26/malaysian-students-in-australia-you-have-less-than-24-hours/
http://www.bytebot.net/blog/archives/2008/02/27/registered-to-be-a-postal-voter
http://polytikus.com/2008/02/19/malaysian-students-overseas-you-can-vote/