The Prime Minister's Office has denied any involvement in the opposition's claim that Malaysians, as well as, foreigners are being flown in to the peninsula to vote in Sunday's polls.In a brief statement, a government spokesperson said: " The Prime Minister's office denies any involvement in these flights."
"The Election Commission has gone to extraordinary lengths to ensure that the electoral system is stronger than ever, and the elections are free and fair."
Meanwhile, Barisan Nasional (BN) Secretary-General Datuk Seri Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor explained that it is normal during elections for organisations and political parties to encourage voters to come to the polling centres.
Even the opposition had chartered buses to bring back voters from Singapore, while Bersih, a non-governmental organisation connected to the opposition, had paid for Malaysians to fly back from Shanghai and Hong Kong.
"The opposition is casting doubts about the fairness of the electoral system in a cynical attempt to undermine Malaysia's democracy. It is a calculated campaign to discredit the electoral system ahead of the election. The opposition are preparing an excuse for their likely loss," he said in a statement here Thursday.
Tengku Adnan said the flights in question were organised and paid for by "friends of BN" to bring registered voters back to their districts so that they may vote in the election.
"There is no substance whatsoever to opposition allegations that passengers were anything other than registered Malaysian voters," he said.
Meanwhile, Malaysia Airlines in a statement tonight said all chartered flights by the national carrier were commercial chartered flights.
"Malaysia Airlines denies all allegations that it is deploying chartered flights to transport phantom voters during Malaysia's 13th General Election," it said.
Opposition leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim at a press conference here today had alleged that there have been a number of chartered flights flying in from Sabah and Sarawak bringing in "dubious individuals" via Kuala Lumpur International Airport since last Thursday.
-- BERNAMA
How the Crime Minister lies........
and yet they still claim to be honorable Muslims who never lie.
Okay to fly in voters, says EC
UPDATED @ 12:53:35 PM 03-05-2013
PUTRAJAYA, May 3 — The Election Commission (EC) said today that it is fine for individuals to ferry voters as long as the beneficiaries are not asked to vote for certain political parties or candidates.
Yesterday, Umno secretary-general Datuk Seri Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor admitted that voters were being flown in to the peninsula, but stressed that the flights were sponsored by “friends” of BN as part of the party’s “get out the vote” campaign for Election 2013.
“It’s okay ... But if they give tickets, money, then ask voters to choose this party or this candidate, then that’s wrong,” said EC chairman Tan Sri Abdul Aziz Mohd Yusof(picture).
“If there are complaints ... MACC will investigate, police will investigate ... If it is proven to be graft, then that party is guilty,” he said, referring to the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission.
The Malaysian Insider understands that EC is not aware of the move by “friends of BN”, but Abdul Aziz explained that nothing can be done to stop the flights.
“Even if it’s true, what’s wrong? Shall we stop the flights and stop people from coming back?” he told The Malaysian Insider.
Datuk Ambiga Sreenevasan said earlier that the “friends” of BN have committed an election offence by flying in voters from east Malaysia to key states in the peninsula.
Ambiga, who is the co-chair of polls watchdog Bersih, also said such flights were “very suspicious” and pointed out that it was usually Sabahans and Sarawakians working in the peninsula who have to fly back home to vote in the Borneo states, and not the other way round.
“It’s an offence under 20(6)(b),” Ambiga told The Malaysian Insider late last night, referring to the Election Offences Act 1954.
The prominent lawyer pointed out that under that section, voters may be ferried to their polling stations across the sea, but that such transportation must be provided to all voters.
She noted, however, that since such flights were provided by “friends” of BN, it was likely that the flights were only for those voting for the coalition.
“You’ve got to give it to everybody. That’s the test. You can’t be selective,” said Ambiga.
Opposition Leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim said yesterday that over 40,000 dubious voters, including foreigners from Sabah and Sarawak, have been flown in since last week to key states in the peninsula like Selangor and Kuala Lumpur.
The Prime Minister’s Office has denied Pakatan Rakyat’s (PR) claim that it is involved in flying in Malaysians and foreigners to the peninsula to vote in Sunday’s polls.
National carrier MAS has also denied allegations that it is deploying chartered flights to transport phantom voters.
Ambiga urged BN to disclose the full list of voters who are being flown in to the peninsula and where they will be casting their votes in what is considered to be the closest election since independence.
“They should just come clean and tell us the whole story — who they are, their names, where are they are supposed to vote and would they have objections to people interviewing them,” said the former Bar Council president.
“Are these west Malaysians living or working in east Malaysia? Why is it they’re in such large groups only in certain areas of west Malaysia?” she added.
MAY032013
Everyone knows caretaker PM Najib Razak’s coalition, BN (Barisan Nasional), is going to cheat in this 13th general election. There’re only two types of people who don’t think BN will cheat – the rural villagers whose best friend is government-controlled mainstream media and BN fans themselves. Former premier Mahathir had cheated his way for a rewarding 22-year-rule. Well, to be fair, it was both cheating and peoples’ stupidity that enabled Mahathir to be where he is today. If all his sons are already billionaires, you don’t need to be a genius to guess the 87-year-old’s personal fortune. And Najib is not going to play clean now that the people have awaken from their stupidity.
The BN’s fate relies solely on Election Commission at this crucial stage. On the other hand, its opponent PR (Pakatan Rakyat) depends entirely on the people. Election Commission is the real kingmaker and it will do anything at its disposal to ensure BN’s new term is renewed. Hence the plan to fly in more than 40,000 suspicious foreigners from Sabah and Sarawak via chartered flights. E-mails exposed how PMO (Prime Minister Office) requested for such huge “reinforcement” using 16 chartered flights from Malaysia Airline System (KLSE: MAS, stock-code 3786) and AirAsia Berhad’s (KLSE: AIRASIA, stock-code 5099).
Initially PMO denied the accusation that it was involved in flying in foreigners to the Peninsular Malaysia to vote in Sunday’s polls. Later, BN’s secretary-general Tengku Adnan admitted that such flights indeed happened to ferry voters. But he said such exercise was sponsored by BN “friends” so there was nothing wrong with it. I supposed when it involves such a massive logistic operation, it’s very hard to cover up. However, Tengku Adnan didn’t say if they’re flying in “legitimate voters” or otherwise. As suspicious as it looks, Election Commission chairmanAbdul Aziz said there is nothing wrong even with such transportation because there’s no indication that these foreigners are being asked to vote for a certain party.
Does he really think people are that naive? Right, PMO specifically asked for these 40,000 foreigners from Bangladesh, Nepal, Indonesia, Philippines and whatnot to be given free flight onboard Boeing 747, sponsored by BN friends, and in return vote for opposition? With such intelligence, I supposed your hamster can be the next Election Commission chairman too, no? They should cook up a more convincing excuse or story rather than such silly justification. What’s next – special police VVIP escort for these foreigners to the polling center to vote?
First, you have indelible ink which turns out to be delible after all. When caught red-handed, Election Commission gave an amazing excuse that it was due to inexperienced officers who didn’t “shake” the indelible inkhard enough, thus you can wash it away with ease. If that was not enough, the Election Commission decided to insult your intelligence that even though the ink is washable, you still can detect the remaining ink if you use magnifying glass (*gulp*). I suppose come May 5 polling day, election officers would be using magnifying glass or microscope to check your finger for traces of ink (*grin*). And now, you’ve generous BN tycoons sponsoring Bangladeshis, Indonesians, Filipinos, Nepalis for a “holiday trip” to polling centers – Cool !!!
Actually, Najib should be able to retain power in this general election, even with Lim Kit Siang’s onslaught in Johor. However his attempt in using ROS at eleventh hour before nomination day to send DAP into disarray by telling the party that its central executive committee (CEC) was not recognised, backfired badly. PR was smart to use the issue to gain sympathy, sending many angry fence sitters to the opposition camp. DAP on its own is not strong in Johor. Even PAS and PKR were finding it hard to penetrate the Johorean Malays. But capitalizing on ROS’s mistake, PR found its silver bullet – portraying BN as an evil big bully. The subsequent huge crowd attending PR ceramahs all over Johor and other states is sending shivers down Najib and Mahathir’s spine.
While PR is still not capable of capturing Johor state, the prospect of the opposition winning a damageable number of parliamentary seats is real. The psychological warfare is in PR’s favour. You can already see defeat in MCA and Gerakan’s faces. To say 80% of Chinese votes are now in the PR’s wallet is an understatement. Seriously, MCA could be wiped out entirely on the planet Earth. The Malay and Indian votes may not be sufficient to save them. Taking the average figures between PR and military intelligence report, PR could win up to 135 parliamentary seats.You may not realize this but Sabah and Sarawak are now an open battlefield without major help from BN.
BN assumes Sarawak can defend itself while Sabah would not have much problem due to multi-corner fights. But DAP has sent Superman Hew Kuan Yau into these states to create havocs especially in the Chinese predominantly area (*grin*). Depending on Najib and Mahathir alone to fight against PR’s batallion of speakers such as Anwar Ibrahim, Lim Kit Siang, Lim Guan Eng, Superman Hew, Nga Kor Ming, Nurul Izzah, Rafizi Ramli and whatnot is simply too overwhelming. Furthermore, too much of BN propoganda in the government-controlled mainstream media is overkill. PR’s ceramahs on the ground are more efficient because of the average Joe and Jane’s interaction. There’s no human touch by blasting BN’s propaganda over TV, radio or newspapers.
What else can Election Commission do to help BN, or rather UMNO? Dirty tricks are aplenty and there’re no ways PR or the people can stop them. For a start, ballot boxes could be diverted or exchangedparticularly in area with infrastructure issue such as Sarawak whereby helicopter will be used. Spooky things do happen so temporary “power blackouts” may happen, with enough time for ballot boxes to “walk on its own” to the nearest Mamak store for teh tarik (*tongue-in-cheek*), and be replaced with unknown ballot boxes. If unofficial results seem to be not in favour of BN, there could be sudden new boxes on its way from rabbit holes.
If you still remember during the last 2008 general election, the then Election Commission chairman Abdul Rashid was visibly upset when he was bombarded by queries as to why he was dragging his feat in announcing the official results. Apparently he ran out of “extra free votes” to save BN’s butts. This time, Election Commission will not repeat the same mistake again. Thus, there would be tons of suspicious votes to go around. That’s why Election Commission warns people not to prejudge voters even though they look like Banglas, Nepalis or Syrians. That’s funny – since when Malaysia becomes United Nations?
The solution to minimize such cheating – go out crazily early in the morning with superb attendance on polling day. With great high turnout, the prospect of phantom voters showing up can be minimized. It would be interesting and fun to see if Election Commission will announce a turnover of above 100% (*grin*). Furthermore, there’s a possibility of two versions of ink being used – “indelible ink” for the average Joes and Janes and “delible ink” for phantom voters or postal voters. Heck, we still do not know if these Banglas have multiple Identification Cards to perform multiple votings. After your voting, you can stay back to learn a trick or two about “ghosts-hunting” – by PR’s ghostbuster team.
As we speak, there’re already confusions as some voters found their names missing from the Election Commission official website. Some speculate that last minute voters “movement” is still going on, either to frustrate voters into giving up voting or to create confusion during polling day in order to prevent high turnout so that postal votes can have greater impact on the final results. Either way, you should go out to check with your nearest PR (or BN) booth tomorrow as your name should be on the final list prior to this “now-you-see-it-now-you-don’t” trick.
Now, even if PR wins the election, can Election Commission announce that their alliance still can’t form the government because it consists of three separate entities and not a legally formed coalition like BN? So can Election Commission announce BN as the winner instead? Sure, you can argue till kingdom come from the legal perspective but the Election Commission can bulldoze everything and ask you to go to court if you wish to challenge its decision. Before you can blink your eyes, BN is already on its way to the palace to be sworn in. And we have not talk about roads to the palace being blocked and diverted elsewhere. The palace would be heavily fortified and guarded.
We may also see PR parliamentary winners “invited” by unknown forces to highly secured places, and suffocated with money to make them defect. This is where Anwar Ibrahim’s influence in the police and military force comes into play. Anwar knows what the BN will do in any eventualities. And BN knows Anwar knew what they would do. Gosh – this is so exciting and I can’t wait for the results on Sunday night (or rather early Monday morning). Election Commission asks everybody not to listen to unofficial results but their own official announcement. What if the unofficial results and Election Commission’s numbers differs in huge number?
Will PR takes to the street because of massive and blatant cheating, and in the process get arrested instantly in order for BN to be sworn in? If this is not bad enough, it seems Penang is having huge problem – underground betting with1 for 100 in favour of Guan Eng’s defeat. This means if you bet RM1 you’ll win RM100 and if you bet RM100 you’ll win RM10,000 – if Lim Guan Eng lose. And considering Chinese loves gambling, well, go figure. Go get your popcorn and coke tomorrow.
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