PKR needs to reform its election system as its party polls which has been mired in controversy and allegations of cheating does not reflect the democratic principles of the party, said PKR Youth chief hopeful Dr Afif Bahardin.

Dr Afif said while the e-voting system, which was introduced for the first time in the polls, was technically flawed, the bigger problem was the entire election process.

“It’s not just the mechanism, (but the entire election process) that the party has to really revisit because it does not truly reflect the democratic principle that we uphold,” he said on the sidelines of the PKR Youth congress in Shah Alam today.

Dr Afif is the outgoing deputy Youth chief who is up against Akmal Nasir and Najwan Halimi for the wing’s top post.

“Now we have 850,000 members and we have shown that we cannot really manage the election process properly because it requires a lot of resources, it runs over nine weeks, the anxiety level is high and it is emotionally draining,” he said of the party polls.

“So I think what is more important is we have to revisit and look how we could conduct party election that will represent the majority of the members on the ground,” he said.

Dr Afif said the party’s new leadership would have to look into reforming the party to move forward.

“I think we have to do some in house reform in order for the party to progress and stay relevant in Malaysian politics.”

The Malaysian Insight reported earlier today that Akmal Nasir is tipped to bag the Youth chief’s post by a slender lead of 50-odd votes over Dr Afif. – November 16, 2018.