Hasan Ali warns Pakatan states can fall if no new voters

The Election Commission (EC) has said some four million voters — mostly the young — have yet to register, prompting a frenzy among political parties to get them registered ahead of the next general election due by 2013.

“It has to be admitted that each PR state can fall if we don’t get a large number of new voters,” Selangor PAS commissioner Datuk Dr Hasan Ali told The Malaysian Insider.

The Selangor state executive councillor stressed that PAS was aware of the matter and was moving its grassroots to register those who have yet to sign up as voters. According to EC records, the DAP and Umno are the most aggressive in signing up new voters, who must be at least 21 years old.

Hasan admitted that PR’s situation in Selangor and Kedah was “under threat” unless it ramps up efforts to get the new voters. PR also controls Penang and Kelantan.

He said efforts to get new voters must be stepped up from now if PR wants to remain in control of the four states, three of which were won in Election 2008.

Hasan was commenting on PAS election director Datuk Abdul Halim Abdul Rahman’s statement that Selangor and Kedah PAS must double their efforts to get at least 50 per cent of the 1.2 million unregistered voters in both states if they wanted to remain in power.

“PAS must get at least 50 per cent of the new voters … there are still about 700,000 who haven’t registered in Selangor and about 300,000 more in Kedah.

“So, we have to set a target of at least registering half of that number to get them to vote for Pakatan in the next general election,” said Abdul Halim, who is also Pengkalan Chepa MP.

Abdul Halim has given until the end of this year for the party to get 500,000 new voters registered under the EC’s year-round registration programme.

Hasan promised his state would double its efforts to sign up new voters, saying it was targeting at least 80 per cent new voters in its campaign.