BERSIH 2.0 chairman Maria Chin Abdullah has made a plea to Malaysians living abroad to resist political fatigue and make their vote count in the next general election.

In a teleconference with Malaysians around the globe yesterday, Chin said there was an urgent need for all voters to participate in the elections as the ruling government had shown clear disinterest in electoral and legislative reform.

“Overseas voters are very important, whether you are small or large in number,” Maria said. 

“This election, I feel that we need all the votes we can get, simply because I feel that the government in charge is not interested in reform.

“So what do we do as voters? We have to send a strong message that we want reform and we can only do it through our vote.

“We have to continue to send that message, that is the way we have to push for reforms,” Maria said to some 30 Malaysians all over the world via teleconference. 

It is the first of a series of teleconferences to be held by Global Bersih, the electoral reform movement’s overseas arm, in the lead-up to the general election that must be called by August.

“If we can’t see that, and think that nothing we do makes any difference, then all will be lost.”

She urged Malaysians not to be discouraged by a perceived lack of change to the country’s electoral system and governance in spite of activists’ best efforts.

“We did make a difference, we brought down the popular vote, we had Malaysians overseas voting. We have done quite a lot.

“Not as much as we want to, but we have to keep on going.

“We want reform. Electoral reform, the rule of law. We don’t want police to abuse their power.”.

According to the Election Commission, there were only 6,000 overseas votes in the last general election

On January 23, the EC announced that all Malaysians living overseas could apply to be postal voters for the general election.

Maria’s plea to overseas Malaysians was in response to the observation of a Malaysian living in Hong Kong, known as James, that the “energy level among the people is much lower” compared with the last election.

“We are (telling) voters, once in five years, we can make a change and this is the time we can make the change,” said Maria.

The ruling Barisan Nasional government retained control of the federal government in the last election in 2013, but lost the popular vote to the now-defunct Pakatan Rakyat.

Maria also addressed a question from one of the teleconference participants on the threat of the #UndiRosak movement, which is calling for Malaysians to abstain from voting or to spoil their votes in protest against perceived inadequacies on both sides of the political divide.

She said that the protest vote would only work in an electoral system that was “cleaner” than Malaysia’s.

“Undirosak doesn’t work for this coming election because the system is stacked against any opposing party. Undirosak will only give the incumbent an advantage.”

According to a World Bank report in 2011, the number of skilled Malaysians living abroad rose 300% in the last two decades, with two in   10 Malaysians with tertiary education opting to leave for Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development countries or neighbouring Singapore.

The World Bank estimates there could be 800,000 to 1.4 million Malaysians living abroad. – February 4, 2018.