DAP MP Ong Kian Ming told a press conference today that the commission by right had to publish a notification in the Federal Government Gazette, as well as in national newspapers, announcing the start of the delimitation exercise to re-draw constituency boundaries.
This has to be done, he said, after notifications were given to the Speaker of the House and the prime minister.
However, Ong charged, the EC had failed to comply with any of these requirements and published a notice in the Gazette on April 29 this year, listing the polling district and polling centres for the federal and state constituencies in Peninsular Malaysia, by way of a “delimitation by stealth” exercise.
“The EC has the right to create new polling districts within the same constituency as per Section 7 of the Elections Act 1958.
“But the EC does not have the right to shift voters from one constituency to another, unless it is in the context of a delimitation exercise,” said Ong.
He claimed that the illegal exercise was done in the bordering state seats of Umno-held Batang Kali and DAP-held Kuala Kubu Baru.
He explained that this move had resulted in 14 localities with 5,590 voters moved from the former to the latter.
This saw the number of voters in Kuala Kubu Baru increase from 21,186 in the last general election to 26,720 at present.
“This represents a whopping increase of 26.1%. At the same time, the number of voters in Batang Kali has decreased from 43,578 to 38,044.
“We cannot help but suspect that this is a strategy used by Barisan Nasional (BN) to win back the state of Selangor by stealth.
“So we call upon the EC to revoke the effects of this illegal delimitation exercise and to return the electoral boundaries in Peninsular Malaysia to the boundaries used in the 2013 General Election,” said Ong.
He added that electoral watchdog Bersih 2.0 would head to the EC’s headquarters in Putrajaya this Friday to demand an answer.
Ong said that if the commission failed to respond appropriately, he and other DAP leaders would serve the EC with a lawsuit.
Kuala Kubu Baru state assemblywoman Lee Kee Hiong, who was also present today, claimed that among her new constituents, was Batang Kali assemblyman Mat Nadzari Mat Dahlan.
“I haven’t met him yet. But when I do, I will ask him if he is ready to be my voter,” she quipped.
EC chairman Mohd Hashim Abdullah when contacted denied the allegations, saying they were untrue and misleading.
In a statement he sent to FMT, Mohd Hashim said the EC had just updated its polling districts to remain relevant with the current times and that this is different from the process of delimitation.
“No changes were made to the boundaries of state and parliamentary areas.
“While updating the list of polling districts, we found that there are some localities which needed to be rectified and placed in the right location.
“This happens when there is a difference between the registration code for the affected localities and their actual position.”
He also said that in line with the sophistication of current mapping technology, the EC successfully identified the affected localities and had updated them back to their exact locations.
The moment the correction is done, the localities’ registered voters would be automatically re-registered to the accurate location, he added.