THE Election Commission needs to have its own enforcement powers if Malaysia wants to ensure free, fair and transparent elections, said Election Reform Committee chairman Abdul Rashid Abdul Rahman.

“We want to create an election management body which is so strong that it’s unshakeable and it doesn’t owe loyalty to anyone,” he told The Malaysian Insight.

“It will be built on law that will allow it to deliver, free, fair and transparent elections so that everyone sees the election as a level playing field.

“That strength must be given to them. If we don’t do that, there’s no point in what we are doing now.”

Rashid, who has served the EC in various capacities since 1979, said he has run six elections from 1979 till 2008 and believes that legislation is the best way to ensure fair elections.

Citing the recent incident where Pakatan Harapan was caught using government vehicles to campaign in the Cameron Highlands by-election, breaking a code of ethics for candidates, he said, no one was bothered about it because it is not law.

“Elections are all about laws. There’s no such thing as fair play.

“It’s about what can be allowed and what cannot be done by law.”

One major change Rashid and his five-month-old ERC are hoping to bring is revamping the current election system to include proportional representation.

The current first-past-the-post (FPTP) system can be unfair to smaller parties, he acknowledges.

“In the past, PKR complained to me that the opposition had more than 50% of the votes in 2013 but the government was formed by Barisan Nasional, that only had 48%.

“They questioned the fairness in the electoral system. Unfortunately, this is the system we have.”

He said the committee is considering a system where the new proportional system will be implemented for parliamentary seats, while FPTP will be retained for state elections.

Rashid said rural voters still want their “wakil rakyat” to service them.

“But in the proportional system, they may not know who their MPs are. We’re not sure if this is what people want but I’m going to suggest this idea.

“It is a fairer way to distribute seats i.e. parties still get represented based on their share of votes when they don’t win any seat under FPTP. Even a small party can survive. The appointed MPs will not have any particular constituency and will just be lawmakers.”

Another revamp under serious consideration, he said, is automatic voter registration.

“Malaysia has some 4.5 million unregistered voters. One of the ways to overcome this is to have automatic registration. It will need some technical adjustments but this is one way to address this issue.”

Rashid also hopes to resolve the issue of a flawed electoral roll, which is known to still contain names of dead voters or where multiple voters are registered under the same address.

“I want to propose for more powers to be given to EC to clean up the electoral roll. At present, the law is weak and there’s no room for EC to clean the roll.”

Another idea mooted during a recent first town-hall discussion with selected civil society groups is a fixed dissolution date, which would no longer allow the incumbent government full power to decide on when elections are held.

This would make it easier for EC, voters and the opposition to plan for the next elections.

“That would be too much to ask of the politicians for now. We can still include it but I don’t it can get through as that is something very dear to them,” said Rashid.

Electoral reform is important if Malaysia wants to have a free, fair and transparent elections.

“It’s important because we are lagging behind and I feel ashamed. We talk about democratic elections in this country and yet we are not democratic.

“But when we look at our laws, it’s a farce.”

He said despite of the results of the last general election, the system remains flawed but the time is ripe to correct the inadequacies.

“We delivered free elections. Fair? I’m not so sure. But this is our chance to do what is right.” – February 19, 2019.