BUTTERWORTH, Sept 22 — Members of the Permatang Pauh PKR division are disappointed that the 2018 party elections there began late although it was scheduled at 10 am.

Voters who arrived at the Dewan Seri Tenggiri voting centre here had to wait for almost an hour before the technical problems were resolved.

They said PKR’s party election committee (JPP) should have made proper preparations before the election process began as this was the first time e-voting was conducted.

A voter, Alias Said, in his 50s, said the JPP was slow in taking action despite knowing this was the first time the elections were conducted through e-voting.

"Many voters who came early had to go back when they could not vote due to technical problems as they were working today, so they have been denied their right to vote,” he told Bernama here today.

"The JPP should have made proper preparations from yesterday, not check it today to see if the system and internet line was working well,” he said.

Another voter, Badariah Mat, 53, said she found out that voting would begin at 10 am and came early to vote as she was working later.

"I came early but at 10.05am, the hall was still closed and many people had lined up. The secretariat told us to wait because there were some problems and we were finally allowed to vote at 10.45am,” Badaria, a factory-worker, said.

Candidate for the post of Central Youth Head Dr Afif Bahardin who was at the voting centre said the JPP should look at the problems in the election process seriously and hoped the matter is quickly resolved.

"The JPP must improve many things and I hope what happened in Penang and Kedah will not happen in the other states,” he said.

Meanwhile in George Town, a voter, Liow Wei Soon, said he had noticed a couple of flaws in the system when he cast his vote in Bukit Gelugor.

The 29-year-old mechanic said profile photos of some candidates were missing in the system, and the sequence of candidates were not in proper order.

However one voter, who was one of the first few people to vote in Bayan Baru, said that the online system was very convenient, and described his experience ‘like going through Facebook on a device’. — Bernama