GEORGE TOWN, JULY 1- Lim Guan Eng has called on the Election Commission (EC) to resign en-bloc following Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Shahidan Kassim’s disclosure that food colouring replaced chemicals in the indelible ink used during the recent general election.
Bagan MP Lim urged the entire EC to resign for defrauding the people and abuse of public funds and power. He also insisted that the whole EC shall resign due to lack of integrity and public credibility to carry out a clean, free and fair constituency re-delineation exercise, in line with principle of “one-person, one-vote, one-value”.
In his written parliamentary reply to DAP’s Segambut MP Lim Lip Eng, Shahidan has said that the indelible ink did not last a week as promised because all the chemicals in the ink were replaced by food colouring.
The Penang CM claimed that Shahidan’s admission debunked EC’s previous claims that silver nitrate was used in the ink and was supposed to last seven days.
Shahidan’s revelation comes after Health Minister Dr S Subramaniam openly contradicted EC chairman Abdul Aziz Mohd Yusof’s claims that the EC consulted the ministry regarding the ink safety.
Abdul Aziz had previously reportedly said that the health ministry had advised EC against adding more than one percent of silver nitrate to the ink, which would have made the ink last.
Lim alleged that the EC was indirectly blaming the ministry for refusing to allow an extra 1% of silver nitrate and causing EC to waste RM 7.1 million on purchasing the indelible ink fiasco that could be easily washed off.
Lim pointed out that Abdul Aziz had failed to produce the ministry letter that stated putting more than one percent of silver nitrate in the ink could damage the kidney and cause cancer. He noted that Subramaniam, who took charge of the ministry after the May 5 polls, had denied ever issuing such letter.
“How many more lies must the public endure from the EC chairman and deputy chairman?” asked Lim in his blog statement.
Shahidan in another reply to Seremban MP Anthony Loke had said RM7.1 million was spent on the ink, adding that the EC cannot reveal its supplier for security reasons.
Lim is amused that national security can be threatened or riots would take place if the supplier was known to public. He alleged that Barisan Nasional’s retention of EC showed that the basic democratic principle of “one-person, one-vote, one-value” would be violated.
He claimed that BN federal government cannot claim political and moral legitimacy since it won smallest 112 parliamentary seats with mere 20% popular votes.
He claimed that the average parliamentary constituency size of a BN seat was 46,510 voters compared with Pakatan Rakyat’s 77,655 voters.
He said the striking contrast of Pakatan’s seat of Kapar with 160,000 voters with BN’s Putrajaya of some 16,000 voters highlighted EC’s unfair constituency delineation exercise heavily favouring BN.
Since the current EC deputy chairman Wan Ahmad Wan Omar was EC secretary at last constituency delineation exercise in 2002, Lim asked on whether the people can expect natural justice.
