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Home Ministry to set up special committee to support PSC

Wednesday, 05 October 2011 10:32am

©The Sun Daily (Used by permission)
by Husna Yusop

PUTRAJAYA (Oct 4, 2011): The Home Ministry will set up a special committee at the ministerial level in support of the newly-established Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) on electoral reforms.

Ministry secretary-general Tan Sri Mahmood Adam said the committee is meant to ensure an orderly work process while providing full cooperation to the PSC in carrying out its functions later.

He said the ministry decided to set up the committee as one of the electoral reforms to be implemented by the government concerned the list of names in the electoral roll.

“In our latest meeting today, we cleaned up the roll by checking the status of 52,000 names which the Election Commission (EC) had given us.

“Some of them have died while some have had their citizenship status revoked. Now, we have cleared their status,” he told theSun when contacted, referring to the meeting between the EC and National Registration Department (NRD) yesterday.

Last week, EC secretary Datuk Kamaruddin Mohd Baria said the commission had struck off 69,293 names from the electoral roll of 12.3 million voters between July and Sept 15 after it confirmed with the NRD that they had died.

He has also said another 1,068 voters had also been removed from the roll as the NRD had revoked their citizenship. He added that the EC was also scrutinising some 50,000 other voters’ record.

Mahmood said the ministry views the PSC as a medium which could function proactively in disseminating information related to the ministry to all relevant parties and stakeholders, particularly the opposition.

“Through this committee, the ministry and all agencies under its jurisdiction would have the opportunity to answer all accusations and untrue allegations leveled against the ministry.

“This proves that we are transparent in dealing with the public and do not mean to conceal anything from the knowledge of any parties,” he added.

Yesterday, the Dewan Rakyat passed a motion on the setting up of the PSC, which comprises nine MPs – five from Barisan Nasional (BN), three from the Opposition, and an independent, and will be chaired by a cabinet minister. They will have six months to deliberate on the framework.

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