Election Irregularities, Votes-Buying, Postal and Phantom Voters Impacting the Sabah GE2008 Results

As mentioned in a previous post, there surely will be complaints on polling irregularities and elections petitions emerging after the dust settles post GE2008. PKR Sabah has announced it would file 7 petitions over the Pensiangan, Papar, Kota Belud and Tuaran Parliamentary results and over the outcome of the State seats of Api-Api, Pantai Manis and Kimanis. My gut feeling is there are more than the afore-mentioned but it would be hard to file petitions based on gut feelings.

Election Irregularities

The election irregularities this time around involve the use of postal votes (called them contingency votes?!) to plus or minus to the total votes cast into order to come to the exact outcome that they want. It goes without saying that this entails friendly SPR or government officials, right? Other complaints include the refusal of election officials to a recount, and BN announcing themselves as winners before 8pm when counting of votes were still going on in a number of tallying centres at midnight.

Vote-Buying

Election irregularities seem not only the main issue, there are also complaints of rampant votes-buying which candidates are no longer afraid to do so openly. People are talking about and comparing the amount of cash each voter got in last weekend's polling, with figures ranging from RM20, RM30, RM50 to RM100 and some even to RM600. Others get cash for airfares and hotel accommodation. The hotter the seat, the bigger the cash payment. So my friends and I joke about planning to turn our respective constituencies into hots seats so that we can maximize the cash we get through our votes. It's a sad day for democracy to see our votes being exchanged for money. But personally, only if one is governed by good principles, I doubt that the cash can change a voter's choice if he/she had already made up his/her mind. Your vote speaks your belief, your principles. So even if someone offers me RM1000 or so, I'd take the money and still vote for what I believe. No one can change that. And there's no need to feel guilty if I didn't vote for the party which gave me the money because that money came from us, the people who paid taxes. In effect, the money was mine in the first place. But still, it is a sad day when people think that principles can be bought and sold.

Phantom voters

Has phantom voters become a bad part and parcel of Malaysian Elections? I hope not. Previously, there have been numerous stories of bus loads of strangers coming into town to vote. I observed that this tactic (i.e., the bus loads of outsiders coming into town to vote) is on the decrease. I guess the news about the Kuala Penyu 1999 incident traveled far and wide in Sabah and frightened a lot of people. In that incident, a few bus loads of foreigners (mostly Indonesians) came into town to vote in the district and were ambushed by the locals as they cross the ferry into town. Their accent gave them away when they tried to find their way to polling stations in the district. There were stories that some were badly beaten, one died and thrown into the river, and others after being chased like dogs around in the small town had to jump into the Kuala Penyu river to escape the wrath of the locals. I, personally, witnessed in the late afternoon that polling day the two bus loads of foreigners holed up in the BN headquarters in town which was surrounded by angry locals who were shouting and cursing and holding big sticks and what-not. The police had to be called in to escort the foreigners out of town. After that incident, I didn't hear of similar stories any more. But then again, people are ingenious and can think of many ways around a problem... like using smaller, inconspicuous cars and coming in just before closing time when most of the locals have gone home. I thought I saw that happening last Saturday...

My last two posts have been a wee bit hard on Sabahan voters. Forgive me, but in my disappointment I had ranted a bit. I thought the cash that they were distributing to almost everyone on polling day somehow managed to buy votes, and that was upsetting. However, they were a number a number of slim majorities and recounting of votes. In a number of polling stations, after the first count, the opposition had clearly won. However after recount, that opposition had lost. These irregularities are evidence enough that all is not well with our election machinery.

Like it or not, all these things are still going on and happening right before our eyes. Any monkey is capable of thinking that if you put all the above together, they can make the election outcome go a certain way.