‘Auto voter registration to take time’

PUTRAJAYA: It will be some time before the automatic voter registration can take effect and it may not be ready in time for the Sarawak state polls, says the Election Commission (EC).

EC chairman Azhar Harun said a “guesstimate” on when the move could come into force would be one and a half years, or more.

“We have to establish a new system that allows automatic registration and for this, we need data from the National Registration Depart­ment, Prisons Department and Health Ministry.

“We need to have a lot of engagement with various stakeholders to carry out the exercise properly so that there will be no major problems,” Azhar told a press conference after attending EC’s ‘Make A Change, Let’s Do It Together’ forum yesterday.

On Tuesday, the Dewan Rakyat unanimously passed the Consti­tu­tional Amendment Bill 2019, which sought to allow automatic registration of voters, reduce the minimum voting age from 21 to 18 and for candidates to be eligible to stand for elections from 18 years old.

The Sarawak state election must be held by June 6, 2021, while the 15th General Election is due by 2023.

“Whether it can be done before the Sarawak election, it is a bit hard to say.

“Although it has to be held by June 6, 2021, the state assembly can still be dissolved much earlier.

“It would be good if the new provisions can be implemented by then as a pilot project, but we also don’t want the state elections to be a testing ground.

“We must ensure every­thing is truly ready first,” he said.

Azhar also reminded Malaysians, who have not registered as voters to do so, and not wait until the automatic voter registration takes effect.

He said they could use the newly-launched MySPR Daftar portal, which allows Malaysians to register online.

“We need to keep up with technology trends, and nowadays, youths want simple solutions where they can register anywhere on their phones or tablets.

“Many transactions such as shopping and banking are done online, and it saves time as compared to conventional methods,” he said.

Those registering at mysprdaftar.spr.gov.my need to provide a front image of their MyKad and a selfie of themselves holding the document.

On a different note, Azhar agreed with a suggestion in the fo­rum that the EC would need a signi­­ficant increase in budget and manpower to implement the new changes.

“In the 14th General Election, we used RM500mil, which had 14 million registered voters.

“With the new changes, we may see up to 22 million voters.

“The costs will definitely be higher,” he said.