PUTRAJAYA: The cabinet has decreed that the Election Commission cannot drop voters who have not changed their old identity cards to MyKad from the electoral roll.

Home Affairs Minister Datuk Seri Radzi Sheikh Ahmad said the cabinet viewed the move as a violation of a citizen’s right to vote.
“It is the cabinet’s view that this cannot be done. When the Election Commission announced it, we felt that it was not right.

“Once people are registered as voters, they are entitled to exercise their voting rights.
“There is no law as yet to say that the old identity card is invalid, so, for these people, all they have to do is to present their old ICs before voting,” Radzi said.
Asked if the matter would be raised with the EC, Radzi said there were no plans to do so.”They are an independent body. They will be able to come up with a more practical method.”
EC secretary Datuk Kamaruzaman Mohd Noor on Sunday said that the names of voters still using the old IC would be deleted from the electoral roll for standardisation with records from the National Registration Department.
On Tuesday, the EC, in a press statement, said there were 22,433 voters with the old IC whose names will be displayed until July 26.
The statement also said that they have until then to appeal to the EC not to remove their names from the electoral roll.
Radzi, when asked when the government would invalidate the old IC to avoid problems like these, said no decision had been made on a deadline.
There are currently over 300,000 Malaysians with the old identity cards who have yet to obtain the MyKad.