Malaysian Election and Army Votes II
By Dr. Rafick
1. A regular commentator on my blog sends me an email requesting me to provide more details on how the voting takes place among soldiers during election. I thought I would share it with some readers for the purpose of knowledge but I must qualify that the process that I am about to describe what was actually the process that I went through prior to leaving the Armed Forces 10 years ago. There might have been some changes since them which I am not privy to.
2. Soldier’s position in a camp or station is very dynamic. Some people go in and others go out. Soldiers are always posted in or posted out or they came in for temporary duties. Every time a soldier is posted in there will be movement orders and in would published in “Perbah II”. This publication is signed by the unit commander which basically sorts of confirmed that someone has been posted in or has been posted out.
3. The moment someone is registered on Perbah II, he is considered “a local resident of the camp” and he can vote. This is a secret document which only stays within the military circulation. It goes without saying that depending on who gave the orders and how the camp commander wants to play ball, Perbah II can always be backdated. Once published, the soldier can cast his vote. There are some ball careers or spineless officers in the Army that is willing to do this. I have seen enough to identify such a character. These are the kind of people that goes up the rank via the “express lane”.
4. It used to be that the entire election process is conducted by the Military themselves. It is being organized by a team set up under the OC Admin or the Adjutant. These two characters are very powerful influencing characters that can make a difference on whether election takes care neatly or otherwise.
5. They organized the place, the military verification officers, the schedule of voting and they control the ballot papers. The EC officers usually observe from a distant and usually do not interfere in the process. They would only receive the sealed bag once voting completes. I was told that since the last 2 GE, political parties agents are allowed to observe the voting process which was absent previously. As usual, the voting exercise is done few days earlier than the actual voting by the general public and while waiting for counting the soldiers ballot are kept in a safe place. In theory it is kept by EC. In practical sense, your guess is as good as mine.
6. Some people may be wondering when and how the votes can be manipulated.
Read more at: http://rights2write.wordpress.com/2009/09/18/malaysian-election-and-army-votes-ii/
