No phantom voters, only propaganda to cast doubts among people: EC chairman

KUALA LUMPUR: The term, phantom voter, does not exist and is only propaganda to cast doubts among the people, according to Election Commission (EC) chairman Tan Sri Mohd Hashim Abdullah.
He said the term was used by certain parties to cast negative impression on the EC.
In fact, there were registered voters who have moved away and are no longer residing in the constituencies where they have registered as voters, or there were also voters who have changed address of the constituencies, he told Bernama recently.
"There are also registered voters only returning to the constituencies every four or five years, and perhaps the local residents can no longer recognise them and made assumption that they are phantom voters.
"As a matter of fact, they are legally registered voters," Mohd Hashim said, commenting on the allegations of some quarters regarding phantom voters in the 14th General Election (GE14).
In the EC's official website, it stated that it has always carried out various efforts to continuously ensure it has an updated electoral roll, particularly, the removal of names of the deceased, an issue that is often politicised by certain parties as phantom voters.
Mohd Hashim said the EC had sent teams to police stations nationwide to obtain copies of the permit for burial to confirm that a person had indeed died, including issuing a request to the deceased's family to produce a copy of the death certificate.
He said for the state of Sarawak, the EC sent its teams to longhouses to identify any members of the longhouse community who died but were not reported to the National Registration Department.
In the meantime, the EC said any citizen caught committing fraud and impersonation as voters can be sentenced to imprisonment of not less than two years or fined of not more than RM5,000 or both under the Election Offences Act 1954, upon conviction. — Bernama