I have submitted the below question because I was asked to raise it when I met a voter in Stadium Perak a few months ago. She walked to me and said that the report regarding the high number unreturned of postal votes (or posted ballot paper ?) was serious. I told her that I did not read about it and would check the news archieve.

The reply of the Prime Minister’s Department is irresponsible. They are not interested at all to locate the 72,058 unreturned posted ballot papers. Why? The number could change the result of some constituencies. Is an offence to take the ballot paper out of the polling stream (without permission)- S.3 (1)(h) Election Offences Act 1954 but, it is ok if the ballot paper is posted to the voter but not returning it. Read the last line of the reply - It seems that it is your democratic right not to return the ballot paper . You can visit the list of qualification as a postal voter here.

If the government
i)is not interested to investigate about the 72,058 unreturned postal votes,
ii) the postal voters are not interested to return the postal votes ( assuming they received it)

then, it is time to abolish postal voting for a fair and transparent election.

I was told repeatedly in different occasions about this story - Mr A wanted the postal votes but the top used the postal votes for his man, Mr B. Mr A was angry and slammed the phone.

Tarikh: 25 Jun 2008

Soalan No. 39

Puan Fong Po Kuan (Batu Gajah) minta Perdana Menteri menyatakan sama ada siasatan telah dilakukan bagi mengenal pasti punca-punca 72,058 undi pos tidak dikembalikan pada pilihanraya umum yang lalu serta di manakah undi-undi tersebut. Apakah kelemahan yang dikenalpasti oleh SPR semasa perjalanan pilihan raya tersebut?
Jawapan: YB Dato’ Seri Mohamed Nazri Abdul Aziz Menteri Di Jabatan Perdana Menteri

Untuk makluman Ahli Yang Berhormat, mengikut peruntukan undang-undang yang berkuatkuasa sekarang, Suruhanjaya Pilihan Raya (SPR) Malaysia hanya bertanggungjawab kepada kertas-kertas undi pos yang dikembalikan sebelum jam 5.00 petang sahaja. Bagi kertas-kertas undi pos yang tidak dikembalikan sebelum jam 5. 00 petang ianya bukan lagi di bawah bidang kuasa SPR. Oleh itu, SPR tidak perlu melakukan siasatan untuk mencari punca-punca kertas-kertas undi pos tidak dikembalikan dan di mana ianya berada. Mengikut undang-undang, selepas undi pos dikeluarkan, ianya terpulanglah kepada tindakan pemilih sendiri. Dalam sistem demokrasi yang diamalkan di Malaysia, adalah menjadi hak seseorang pengundi untuk mengundi ataupun tidak. Sekian, terima-kasih.