Review e-voting procedures, PKR polls panel told
> ‘Members unfamiliar with new balloting system’
BUKIT MERTAJAM: Penang PKR leaders have urged the party’s election steering committee to review how e-voting is conducted following Saturday’s fracas over the results in Kedah.
Bukit Mertajam PKR division head Lee Khai Loon said the members are not familiar with the evoting system.
“They don’t know how to use the QR-code to register to vote. We should have done a dry run first before implementing the system,” Bernama reported Lee as saying yesterday.
Lee, who is the Machang Bubuk assemblyman, said the election committee needs to rectify the situation.
He also urged the party’s disciplinary board to act against members who started a ruckus at the press conference.
Seberang Jaya assemblyman Dr Afif Bahardin, who is vying for the party’s Youth wing top post, said the election committee has to clarify what happened.
He also asked whether the results in Penang and Kedah should stand following complaints of irregularities in the voting.
The complaints included names of candidates were missing, some names shifted to other divisions without their knowledge and uncooperative election officials.
In SUNGAI PETANI, police have detained another 10 men believed to have been involved in the scuffle.
Kuala Muda district police chief ACP Adzli Abu Shah said with the arrest, police have detained 14 men aged between 20 and 50 to assist in investigations.
“The 10 men were nabbed around Kuala Muda district between 11pm and 2am but a man who is in his 50s was released on police bail due to health reasons,” he said when contacted by Bernama.
Adzli said the 13 men have been remanded for three days beginning yesterday to facilitate investigations under Section 148 for rioting.
In IPOH, Perak PKR elections scheduled to be held yesterday have been postponed indefinitely after scuffles over the results and technical glitches in Kedah and Penang.
PKR central election committee chairman Datuk Rashid Din issued the directive to hold off the polls on Saturday night.
“We do not want any untoward incidents to occur although the members are well disciplined,” Perak PKR chairman Datuk Dr Mohd Nor Manuty said yesterday.
In KOTA KINABALU, PKR president-elect Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim said the postponement of party elections in several states yesterday and today was to ensure a clean election process.
He said the postponement would allow the party’s election committee to rectify weaknesses that were discovered.
“There were weaknesses in the elections, that is why the election is postponed in some states, Kedah, yesterday, and Perak today to ensure the election is clean.
“My answer to those who threw chairs, they will be thrown out of the party,” he said when speaking at the Malaysia Day celebration organised by Api-Api PKR.