news source:malaysiakini

The interim report by the parliamentary select committee (PSC) on electoral reforms was tabled to the Dewan Rakyat today and a motion to debate the document would be tabled tomorrow.

The document was produced after two rounds of public hearings in Parliament and in Kota Kinabalu.

Salient points of the recommendations are as follows:

RCI on Project IC

• Establishment of royal commission of inquiry to probe allegations of a citizenship-for-votes campaign to alter the voter demographics in Sabah.

Indelible ink

• Indelible ink be used to mark voters to prevent multiple voting.

Postal voting

• Those on duty in remote areas must apply for postal voting.

• Election Commission staff, doctors, nurses and journalists qualify for early voting.

• Absentee voting for all Malaysian citizens residing abroad.

• Inter-state voting for East Malaysians residing in the peninsula be allowed to vote and vice-versa.

Transfer of voting area

• Applications to transfer voting address must include a statutory declaration.

Electoral roll audit

• The PSC recommends Mimos Bhd to perform the audit.

• The audit should target duplicate IC numbers, deceased, voters aged 90 and above, non-citizens and large number of voters in a single address.

• For Sabah, the entire electoral roll needs to be vetted.

Display of electoral roll

• Display period doubled to 14 days.

• Abolish RM10 fee for objections against each voter.

• Abolish maximum limit of voters which can be questioned by a single complainant.

Polling centres

• Removal of serial numbers on ballot papers and retain it on the counterfoil.

• Rearrange desks in polling centres to allow scrutineers to identify voters easily.

• Allow visually impaired voters to choose whomever they wish to mark their ballot papers.

Election Commission

• EC must be allowed to enforce election laws.

• Increase EC resources and make them independent.

• EC must conduct voter education programmes.