CAMERON HIGHLANDS, Jan 22 — The Election Commission (EC) will not extend the voting time in some rural areas here on polling this Saturday, despite a plea from Umno secretary-general Tan Sri Annuar Musa.
Its chairman Azhar Azizan Harun today said that there were safety and logistics reasons to close voting early in those rural districts for the mountainous Pahang parliamentary seat.
“We will not extend the voting time for safety reasons and it terms of logistics it is very dangerous as we need to use helicopters,” he told reporters after visiting the Brinchang police station here where early voting was held for affected personnel who would be on duty on polling day.
“We closed early in some of the voting centres in rural areas during the previous general election as well. I don’t think it will affect the voters in the area from voting,” he added.
Annuar had asked the EC to reconsider extending the voting time in some rural Cameron Highlands districts.
According to the Umno man, only four out of the 29 district voting centres — Bertam Valley, Tanah Rata, Ringlet and Brinchang — would operate from 8am to 5.30pm while the remainder would close early, between 2pm and 3pm.
An election officer later told Malay Mail that some of the rural voting districts are scheduled to close as early as 1pm on Saturday. The full list of closing times for the different voting centres was not available at the time of writing.
Azhar also denied that the EC was turning a blind eye to electoral offenders, reiterating his assertion yesterday that it has taken the necessary action on allegations and issued a stern warning to all campaigning political parties.
“We have taken necessary action based on the power given to us by the law. I have done everything from giving out information to Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission and police, issuing advice and warning and also required all concerned parties to sign affirmative covenant.
“This is what I can do. If any individual wants me to do more like investigating or arresting, then they need to go to Parliament and ask the members of Parliament to pass a new law as the current law does not allow us to do so,” he said.
Azhar urged those who suspected electoral violations were taking place to file a police report first to enable action to be taken.
“The only action that we can take whether immediate or not is by lodging police report. Those who have direct information please report it to the police and let the authorities to do their job,” he said.
