Voters fume over long wait
KUALA LUMPUR: Voters across the country vented their frustration on social media after queueing for hours at their polling stations just to cast their ballot, the Malay Mail reported.
One voter claimed he stood two hours at SMK USJ12 in Subang Jaya, Selangor before finally getting her turn at 10.30am.
“The problem I noticed was that the saluran wasn’t clearly labelled. We had to ask people for directions,” said Melissa who was at the school with her sister Mag.
According to Melissa who joined the queue that snaked for blocks around the school, the line did not move for the first 10 minutes.
It only got going after a woman she believed to be an Election Commission official came out of a classroom and gave voters instructions to hasten the process by asking them to prepare their identity cards for checking.
The wait was worse at the Kolej Vokasional Klang where some voters said claimed they waited almost five hours to cast their vote.
First time voter, A. Devan said he arrived at the polling centre at 10am and was only able to enter the room to cast his vote at 2.30pm.
“It’s my first time. I didn’t know the queue would be this long.
“I was told go over the polling centre at around 4pm to avoid the queue but decided against it because I need to get to work,” said the 35-year-old aircraft engineer.
Another Klang voter, Jamaliah Ehsan, said she too waited for hours to cast her votes.
“It is my fifth time voting, but this is my first time seeing such large turnout at this place,” said the 43-year-old company secretary.
“And surprisingly people are very patient and nice to each other. There were no pushing, shoving or even those trying to cut queue,” she added.
In the Penampang district of Sabah, hundreds of voters at the SMK Bahang polling station stood in lines that snaked from the corridors outside the classroom to out the school gates and down the road.
“How to be a developed nation like this?” muttered one voter who said he had been in a queue since 8.45am but had yet to receive the number for his voting stream.
DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng lashed out at the Election Commission (EC) for the disorganised and lengthy wait voters had to bear before they could vote.
He said the waiting time for voters is longer than the 13th general election.
“The laws used for this process are not suitable for this time and day that voters have to wait for three hours that even two voters had passed away,” he told reporters after casting his vote at SMK Chung Hwa Confucian in George Town.
Lim was referring to a case in Terengganu and another in Petaling Jaya, Selangor where the would-be voters collapsed and died in line before they could cast their ballots.
He expressed his condolences to the families of the two who died yesterday.