SUBANG JAYA, Sept 22 — Several villagers in rural Sarawak missed the chance to vote when polling centres in their constituency were shut down within only three hours of opening, the Bersih tribunal was told today.
Roland Engan, a PKR candidate who lost the Baram parliamentary seat by only 194 votes to his Barisan Nasional rival, complained that voters queuing outside two polling stations there were not allowed to vote, obstensibly because the voting period had ended.
“Suddenly the polling centre was closed abruptly around 11 o’clock in the morning,” he told a five-man panel.
“It was informed to us later that the polling station was open from eight to 11,” he said, adding that there was “no notice posted” of the operating hours of the polling centres.
“Most of the voters queued out outside the polling stations were our supporters,” Roland later claimed, having lost the contest by only 194 votes to his Barisan Nasional (BN) rival.
According to Roland’s statutory declaration, votes were also counted without the presence of Roland or his election agents.
Roland said the vote-counting started at noontime, five hours ahead of the official tallying time.
“The tallying process actually started from around 12 noon, contrary to agreement made among the parties during the briefing on nomination day. It’s supposed to start at 5 o-‘clock,” Roland said.
The People’s Tribunal on the 13th general election, which is organised by polls watchdog Bersih, has been hearing evidence since September 18 on alleged vote-rigging in the contentious polls, with the five-day hearing to end today.
The citizen’s initiative does not have the legal authority to enforce its recommendations, but has the “moral authority” to be accepted by Putrajaya, according to Bersih.
The five-member People’s Tribunal is led by Yash Pal Ghai, a former United Nations Special Representative and constitutional law expert.
The other members are former Indonesian Electoral Commission deputy chairman Ramlan Surbakti, prominent lawyer Datuk Azzat Kamaludin, University of Malaya associate senior fellow Mavis Puthucheary and Rev Dr Hermen Shastri, the general secretary of the Council of Churches of Malaysia.
More to come
