NST: 7 Mar 2008
GEORGE TOWN: The Malaysians For Free and Fair Elections (Mafrel) want the state Election Commission to explain their officers’ absence during the postal voting exercise for police and army personnel. Its northern region co-ordinator Ong Boon Keong said yesterday that instead of supervising the exercise, the EC had tasked uniformed police officers and soldiers to do it.
“The EC should assume full control of the postal voting instead of asking police and army personnel to monitor it.
State EC officer Ahmad Shafee said the commission had appointed police and army officers to co-ordinate the process in accordance with the provisions of Election Regulations (Postal Votes) 2003.
“There are only 24 full-time EC officers in the state, so we have to outsource manpower to monitor the vote casting,” he said.