SPR sinks further into opacity and sluggishness

SPR transparency has deteriorated notably since mid 2008. Further, SPR slowed down quarterly gazetting of electoral rolls to 5 months.

These are the opacity, sluggishness, and oddities we have observed in SPR performance:

1. SPR no longer cites the specific gazette date for the electoral rolls to be used in the April 7 by-elections.

Regarding Bukit Selambau (P014N25) and Bukit Gantang (P059) by-elections, SPR informed Bernama (but without written statement on SPR's own Website) only in general quarterly. The SPR chairman said that "the electoral roll to be used was the Master Electoral Roll 2007 which had been merged with the supplementary electoral rolls for the first, second and third quarters of 2008." (See 3-in-1 By-Elections on April 7?)

When were these rolls officially gazetted? SPR didn't say.

We are left to dig and assume that, for the electoral roll ending third quarter (2008 Sep 30), the gazette date must be the latest gazette date 2009 February 19, displayed in the header on the voter look-up page at http://daftarj.spr.gov.my/daftarj/daftarbi.aspx (this is an already-gazetted, nationwide, roll for voters to look up on an individual basis). However, this is only an assumption, because SPR has previously used different by-election rolls than the latest-gazetted, nationwide, roll.

SPR's statement on Batang Ai to Bernama was even more opaque, failing to cite any data date or quarterly periods for the electoral roll to be used. See http://www.bernama.com/bernama/v3/bm/news.php?id=393934


2. SPR has failed to publicize official verification and gazetting processes since mid-2008:

1. the quarterly display and verification of supplementary rolls, and
   
2. the eventual gazetting of the quarterly changes to add to the nationwide electoral roll.

By law, quarterly (supplementary) changes to voter rolls must be displayed for the public to check before being gazetted.

But SPR seems to have kept an extremely low profile on these events in the second half of 2008, failing to make public statement about the displays or gazette. There has been no official SPR press statement on the SPR Web site or through the government mouth piece Bernama.

Why this secrecy in second half of 2008? Did SPR fear the inevitable confusion and protest by Permatang Pauh (P044) and Kuala Terengganu (P036) voters, due to the variances between those 2 by-election rolls (respectively dated 2008 July 31 and 2008 Dec 5) from the nearest nationwide gazetted rolls (respectively dated 2008 Jul 19 and 2008 Nov 28)? See "What's so complicated ..." and "surprises and guesses."

We are left to grasp at haphazard clues such as these:

• In December 2008 when we checked SPR's nationwide voter lookup page, the header revealed SPR has a gazetted version from 2008 November 28 (it has since been updated to the latest 2009 Feb 19). See our earlier post about "surprises and guesses."
  
• However, SPR statement to Bernama indicated it had also gazetted another by-election roll a few days later on 2008 Dec 5 for the KT by-election.
  
• We are again left to assume, that the KT roll was based on 2008 2nd quarter changes, meaning the changes were gazetted nearly 5 months after the close of the second quarter on 2008 Jun 30.

So far we learn a few things:

• a by-election roll may be gazetted (as in KT P036) or not gazetted (as in PP P044),
• a different by-election roll can be prepared only a few days after a nationwide roll has already been gazetted (especially in KT)
  
• A quarterly roll is recently being gazetted about 5 months after the quarter closes.
  

What did and did not the SPR publicize?

• SPR only publicized the SMS/Website by-election voter look-up on an individual basis. This is a very narrow announcement meant only for by-election voters, and only after gazette. An example of such an announcement is http://www.bernama.com/bernama/v5/news_lite.php?id=392795.
  
• In contrast, before mid-2008, SPR had faithfully announced that quarterly supplementary rolls for nationwide changes were available for verification at post offices and on the Web before they were gazetted. An example of such a broad announcement was made in January 2008 regarding 2007Q4 changes: http://www.bernama.com/bernama/v5/newsindex.php?id=307312
• The by-election voter look-up page (post-gazette? non-gazette?) for Bukit Selambau and Bukit Gantang (http://daftarj.spr.gov.my/semakp59n25/prayakecil.aspx) does not display a gazette date. Why?
  
• Only the nationwide (post-gazette) roll for voter to look up (http://daftarj.spr.gov.my/daftarj/daftarbi.aspx) did display a gazette date of 2009 Feb 19.
  

Questions, phrased differently:

• Why weren't the pre-gazette verification of the 3rd and 4th quarterly changes of 2008 publicized in the media, newspapers, and post offices?
• Why wasn't there any media notice or official press statement about the November 28, 2008 (presumably 2008 second quarter changes) gazetted roll just before KT by-election, and the recently gazetted roll of Feb 19, 2009 (presumably 2008 third quarter changes)?

• If the nationwide roll is identified as gazetted on 2009 Feb 19, but the by-elections rolls are not identified as gazetted, does that mean there have been changes to the by-election rolls of Bukit Selambau and Bukit Gantang rolls compared to the gazetted nationwide rolls?
  

3. SPR has sharlply slowed down its quarterly voter verification and gazettes.

While it took only 36 days to gazette the December 2007 changes by 2008 Feb 5 for the 2008 March 8 GE12, verification and gazettes since mid-2008 have been sluggish and non-transparent, and took nearly 5 months. (Note the 2007 fourth quarter roll had included a rush of enthusiastic voter registrations and massive postal movements, anticipating GE12.)

• What about 2008's 4th quarter? Why are we still using 2008 third-quarter roll changes?
• The gazetting process seems to have stretched out to about 5 months by now, compared to about 1 month for early 2008.

• Register for 6 months before you can vote: A voter in Bukit Gantang and Bukit Selambau who registered at the beginning of October 2008, eg, will not be able to vote in the by-elections, even more than 6 months after registration (from 2008 Oct 1 to 2009 Apr 7).
  

Table A shows that the pace of voter roll verification and gazette has slowed down to about 5 months.

Table A: Gazetting Process Slowing to 5 Months

Quarterly voter changes	2007Q4	2008Q1	2008Q2	2008Q3	2008Q4
Quarter closing	2007Dec31	2008Mar31	2008Jun30	2008Sep30	2008Dec31
Display on Web	Yes	Yes	No	No	No
Gazette date	2008Feb5	2008Jun16	2008Nov28	2009Feb19	???
Days from quarter closing	36	107	151	142	???

4. Timing of by-election is dubious :

• KT's by-election had to wait for 51 days (out of the maximum 60 days allowed by law) because of the northeast monsoon rain in December, but Bukit Selambau and Bukit Gantang had to wait for 57 days for what?
• Why does by-election on a Tuesday, not on weekends, or even a Monday or Friday?
  
• Does Apr 4, Saturday, or 54 days make any difference in "security" except that minus 9 days means smack in the middle of UMNO party election?
  
• Why does nomination day on March 29 have to wait until just after UMNO's party election on March 28?

• Why create the longest-ever wait for by-election of 57 days, nearly the longest allowable by law, but the shortest allowable campaigning period of 9 days? Why not more campaigning days to accomodate the three differently-located by-elections?
  
• Why 3 by-elections on the same day, that will stretch all the media, opposition political parties, NGOs, volunteers, except the well-financed governing coalition which has never been ashamed or penalized for abusing government machinery and funds?

Also see:

• TheMalaysianInsider.com: EC fixes April 7 by-elections amid mixed reactions
• MalaysiaKini.com: Pakatan cries foul over polls date (subscription)
  
• Lim Kit Siang: Bukit Gantang/Selambau by-elections on April 7 - another example of craven subservience of Election Commission to serve Umno interests

More opacity:

• The online display of PDF copies of quarterly electoral changes on SPR Website has been discontinued since 2008Q2. see SPR becoming less transparent. Why?
  
• The official CD containing the roll only have a hand-writted "disahkan" (authenticated/confirmed) "18/2/2009," without details inside the CD.

• SPR seems to stop preparing any official announcement and stopped posting them on its website. As of 2009 March 8, we can only find press releases from 2008. Newspaper cutting is up to 2007. The latest statements on Bukit Selambau, Bukit Gantang, Batang Ai, are not carried on its website. It only contains an announcement to check voter roll for Bukit Selambau and Bukit Gantang, but not Batang Ali.
• Apparently the SPR is more interested in voters using SMS to check their status at RM0.35 extra charges per enquiry.
• Also see: http://www.spr.gov.my/index/pagemulabi.htm and http://www.spr.gov.my/index/news.htm