{"id":4364,"date":"2013-03-05T12:29:43","date_gmt":"2013-03-05T04:29:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/?p=4364"},"modified":"2013-03-05T12:29:43","modified_gmt":"2013-03-05T04:29:43","slug":"ambiga-disappointed-with-electoral-reform-progress","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/ambiga-disappointed-with-electoral-reform-progress\/","title":{"rendered":"Ambiga disappointed with electoral reform progress"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>KUALA LUMPUR, 4 Mar \u2014 Chairperson of the Coalition for Clean and Fair Elections, Bersih, Ambiga Sreenevasan suggested that the civil society would only throw their support for the Election Commission (EC) only if the commission is dedicated towards cleaning up the electoral roll and holding free and fair elections.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you clean up and if you are fair, we will be the biggest supporters of the system,\u201d Ambiga said.<\/p>\n

Ambiga said this when speaking at the International Conference on Malaysia 13th<\/sup>General Elections here today, revealing her grievances over EC\u2019s slow, if not sparse efforts in implementing reforms within the electoral system ahead of the country\u2019s nearing polls.<\/p>\n

The former Malaysian Bar Council president extended her doubts over the independence of the EC, saying that the commission\u2019s low sensitivity towards different parties\u2019 conflicts of interests is made obvious when EC officials have been seen issuing statements that are \u201cbiased in favour of one party over another\u201d.<\/p>\n

According to Ambiga, with remarks such as \u2018nothing wrong with all the electoral officials being party members\u2019 released unapologetically by top EC guns, it is of no surprise that the neutrality and credibility of the commission should be put into question.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile saying these [statements], how could they [the EC] say \u2018why don\u2019t you have confidence to us?\u2019\u201d Ambiga asked.<\/p>\n

A recently introduced clause by the EC for overseas voters also came under heavy criticism from Bersih at the conference. The new ruling stated that in order to qualify for postal voting, Malaysians overseas must have returned home in the last five years, and spent time in Malaysia for 30 days at minimum.<\/p>\n

Ambiga motioned the 30-day benchmark as \u201cunfair\u201d as it has been \u201cunilaterally imposed the EC\u201d without engaging the matter with anyone else beforehand, particularly members of the public.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn two months, how are they [postal voters] supposed to rush and fulfill the condition imposed by the Election Commission?\u201d she argued. The ruling was only announced by the EC on January this year, with its deputy chairman Wan Ahmad Wan Omar remains convinced that the new rule is \u201creasonable\u201d.<\/p>\n

Things need to be fixed<\/strong><\/p>\n

Clearly unimpressed by the level of response given by the EC towards the civil society\u2019s demands for electoral reform, Ambiga foresaw \u201cno clarifications that things will be fixed\u201d before the coming general elections, which has to be called by June.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you have an EC that is not responsive to complaints on the electoral roll, how can the public trust them?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTell me why you cannot be transparent about the electoral roll, and then we can talk about free and fair elections in this country,\u201d Ambiga reminded the EC, further describing the \u00a0responses given by the commission as reaching a point that it is \u201cso ludicrous as to insult our intelligence\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe could have cleaned up the electoral roll, and the civil society could have helped,\u201d she said, repeating her regret towards the EC\u2019s banal progress in paying heed to calls for better monitoring of the list of voters.<\/p>\n

Nonetheless Ambiga took a lighter note on one of Bersih\u2019s demands to have a 21-day period of campaigning, a timeframe longer than the 10-day provision currently allocated by the Election Commission.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe now have two years\u2019 period of campaign,\u201d she noted, drawing laughter from the audience.<\/p>\n

Speculations on the actual date of the 13th<\/sup>\u00a0General Election has been lurking for nearly two years now, with both sides of the political divide have been far from silent in promoting their parties ever since.<\/p>\n

Ambiga later lengthened her views in a lower tone regarding the freedom of media, noting that while it is the \u201ceasiest of the demands\u201d, nothing significant has been done either by the EC or the ruling party to improvise.<\/p>\n

Malaysia currently sits at the 145th\u00a0<\/sup>place in a ranking released by Freedom of the Press 2013, a remarkably low position in a list of 179 countries.<\/p>\n

No-nonsense election commissioners much needed<\/strong><\/p>\n

Responding to rampant cases of foreign workers being given instant Malaysian citizenships in exchange for their votes to the ruling party, Ambiga posed a question: \u201cIs it acceptable to them [the EC] that foreigners are now able to vote in our country?\u201d<\/p>\n

Ambiga cited the case of a few Pakistani nationals that have been casting their votes as Malaysian citizens for five general elections. \u201cThey still go back to Pakistan,\u201d she told the audience, \u201cSeeing their families using Malaysian passports.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd they are laughing. They\u00a0should<\/em>\u00a0be laughing at us!\u201d<\/p>\n

Ambiga then emphasized that it is crucial to have strong, no-nonsense election commissioners, who will stand up against whatever electoral misconduct there would be. The audience, made up of a sizable number of elected representatives, gave a loud thumping of the tables in agreement.<\/p>\n

Ambiga also invited the participants of the conference and all interested Malaysians to visit Bersih\u2019s website in finding out how to play a part in becoming election observers for the coming polls. \u2014 The Rocket<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KUALA LUMPUR, 4 Mar \u2014 Chairperson of the Coalition for Clean and Fair Elections, Bersih, Ambiga Sreenevasan suggested that the civil society would only throw their support for the Election Commission (EC) only if the commission is dedicated towards cleaning up the electoral roll and holding free and fair elections. \u201cIf you clean up and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4365,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[260],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4364","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4364","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4364"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4364\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4365"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4364"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4364"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.therocket.com.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4364"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}