Malaysians who turn 21 should be automatically registered as voters, said former Election Commission (EC) chairman Tan Sri Abdul Rashid Abdul Rahman. He said this would solve the issue of inadequate number of voters at the ballot.
“There
are 16 million eligible Malaysians but only 12.5 million are registered
as voters. Even with that figure, only 80% turned out on election day
to vote,” he said.
Abdul Rashid, who had overseen six general
elections and state elections, agreed that the automatic registration
exercise would not be easy to implement.
“There are registered
voters who had moved elsewhere and did not bother to change their
addresses,” he said, adding that the EC cannot change the voters'
address without consent.
On the Malaysian election system, Abdul Rashid said it was fair contrary to what the detractors say.
“I
would say that our elections are free and fair, as far as our laws are
concerned,” he said at a forum titled “MPs in Conversation:
Parliamentary Elections & Funding” at Sunway University here on
Thursday.
The other speakers were Rasah MP and DAP Socialist Youth national chief Anthony Loke, and Professor Dr Edmund Terence Gomez from the faculty of economics and administration of Universiti Malaya.
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