KUALA LUMPUR: Pos Malaysia today gave its assurances that its staff will uphold integrity in handling postal votes for the upcoming 14th general election (GE14).
Its postal and courier group chief operating officer Datuk Azlan Shahrim said Pos Malaysia was ready to provide the best service to ensure postal votes, whether from Malaysians in the country or overseas, would be handed over to the Election Commission (EC).
He dismissed allegations that Pos Malaysia was perfunctory in serving the people during a general election.
“This will not be our first time managing postal votes. We had experience during GE13 and by-elections. So there is no issue. Pos Malaysia’s duty is to distribute postal votes to eligible voters and then send the votes to EC,” he said.
Azlan was speaking to reporters after launching the “Pos ArRahnu Persona Gold Contest”.
Present were Pos Malaysia postal and courier chief commercial officer Nor Azizan Tarja and Pos ArRahnu chief operating officer Abdul Razak Mohd A Kadir.
Meanwhile, Nor Azizan said Pos Malaysia was working closely with EC to ensure the smoothness of operations on polling day, including extending service time should the polling day fall on a Sunday or a public holiday.
“We had briefings and meetings with the EC starting a few months ago and all the state managers and branch managers have been instructed to stand by.
“More than 2,000 Pos Malaysia staff are involved in GE14. We will also increase postal votes collection to twice a day till polling day,” he said.
The number of postal votes in GE14 is expected to be higher than that of the previous election.
This is because the requirements for eligibility for postal voting have been loosened for nine departments and agencies whose employees will be on duty on polling day.
These are the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency, Prisons Department, Fire and Rescue Department, Health Department (government hospitals and clinics only), Police Volunteer Reserve, Civil Defence Force, Immigration Department, National Disaster Management Agency and National Registration Department (for staff at Urban Transformation Centres).