Voter numbers spike: Sabahans want answers from EC, NRD, says KDCA

21 October 2022

KOTA KINABALU: Election Commission (EC) and the National Registration Department (NRD) must explain on the alleged spike in voters in Sabah to the people, said Kadazandusun Cultural Association (KDCA) Deputy President Datuk Seri Panglima Clarence B. Malakun.

He said the issue is vital to the people in the state who will soon be exercising their rights to vote for the next government.

“This is a very alarming revelation and allegation. We’ve received a lot of calls from people demanding to know the truth. Perhaps, the EC and NRD are in the best position to explain.

“Sabahans have long been living under the suspicion that non-Sabahans have managed to cast votes. We’ve heard about them getting ICs. We’ve heard about the scandalous Projek IC. And now this,” he said.

He suggested that the NRD should have a proper verification exercise to determine if the new voters are holding properly issued and legal identity cards.

“Verify if they are really genuine people of Sabah or otherwise.”

“But the big question remains: why they did not register themselves as voters before?” he asked.

Malakun said he hope the EC is committed in cleaning up Sabah from all these mess.

“Our leaders are all united in wanting to build a better Sabah for Sabahans.”

“To move forward to a better future, we must first exorcise the demons that have been haunting us for a long time and the mother of them all is non-Sabahans casting votes to decide the government of our choice,” he said.

Few days ago, Sabah Progressive Party (SAPP) made a shocking revelation about the spike in voter numbers in Sabah.

It pointed out that the electoral roll released by the Election Commission (EC) revealed a 53.9 per cent increase in new voters, from 1,064, 686 in 2008 to 1,638,806 this year, prompting SAPP President Datuk Seri Panglima Yong Teck Lee to suspect that the surge could be due to a high number of dubious voters that came about from the Project IC scandal.

Yong reportedly claimed that based on a preliminary review of the 2022 election roll, many of the new voters were aged above 30 years old while some in their 60s.

He also found it suspicious to see so many middle-aged people as newly registered voters.

Later, Parti Solidariti Tanahairku (STARSABAH) said it found it to be shocking to learn that there was a very unusual spike in the number of voters in Keningau.

Its President Datuk Seri Panglima Dr Jeffrey Kitingan said that he came to learn that the increase in the Keningau parliamentary constituency was over 70 per cent.

“This is very unusual and suspicious,” he said.

He disclosed that the number of voters in Keningau parliamentary was 51,777 in 2018 but jumped to 87,371 in 2022, making it a 70.7 per cent increase.

He also said that he was informed the number of U18 in Keningau parliamentary was less than 8,000.

“There’s no way we can have an increase of over 30,000 in just less than five years. Something is wrong,” he said.