The Api-Api assemblyman alleged the move had taken place even before the 2013 general election (GE13).
“To date, over 7,000 voters had been moved into my Api-Api constituency.
“And on top of that, more than 1,000 Chinese voters from my constituency were transferred elsewhere. I believe many of them may not even be aware of it,” said Liew, who also heads Sabah Pakatan Harapan (PH).
She said such an “undemocratic and unethical” practice needed to be stopped once and for all, adding that the only way to achieve this was to have a change of government.
“I appeal to all the genuine voters of Api-Api to come out in full force to vote against the 7,000-plus ‘imported, fixed deposit voters’ in the coming general election,” she said.
She reminded the people to check their voter status at the nearest Election Commission (EC) office or the post office to ensure all was in order for the coming polls.
”This coming general election is probably the last and best chance for them to effect change for a better future for the country,” Liew said.
Api-Api sits alongside Luyang and Likas within the Kota Kinabalu parliamentary constituency. Except for Luyang, the other two seats are held by the opposition.
Sabah PKR also demanded that the Sabah government make public the details of its application to the federal government for the redelineation of the state’s parliamentary constituencies.
Liew said Sabahans had the right to know how the move would affect their future.
“As a responsible state government, it should have automatically informed the public, right from the beginning, on what are the proposed new parliamentary constituencies in the application.
“There should be nothing to hide from the public,” she said, responding to the statement issued by state secretary Sukarti Wakiman on the application by the state government to the federal government for the redelineation of Sabah’s parliamentary constituencies.
Sukarti had said the redelineation was justified as the last one was done 15 years ago in 2003.
However, Liew said, Sukarti did not provide any information on the proposed constituencies except to say that the application was made in light of the approval given for the proposed redelineation of state constituencies by the Sabah state assembly.
As such, she claimed, this was yet another gerrymandering exercise by the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) government to ensure it wins in the 14th general election (GE14), especially at the federal level.
“It’s a questionable move indeed, especially considering the fact that the EC’s redelineation report on the review of the Sabah electoral boundaries and the increase in 13 state seats was excluded without any explanation when it was tabled in Parliament recently,” she said.
Liew said this was despite the Sabah government having amended the state constitution in August 2016 to increase the number of state seats from 60 to 73, around the same time the EC started its redelineation study nationwide.
She said many political observers believed that the exclusion was likely due to the BN-led Sabah government realising that the increase in 13 state seats might not necessarily be to their advantage.
She also expressed regret over the state government’s lackadaisical response to the exclusion of the EC’s redelineation report on the review of the Sabah electoral boundaries and the increase of 13 state seats in Parliament recently.
Sabah: We want new state, federal seats tabled together in Dewan Rakyat