There will be no cheating in the next general election, Prime Minister Najib Razak proudly said two days ago.
He sounds like a stand-up comedian.
The cheating has already taken place even before the election is called, through the redrawing of electoral boundaries by the Election Commission (EC).
The EC has to complete the redelineation exercise by September 2018.
But the speed in which they are working seem to allude they are following Najib’s election calendar.
Many Malaysians voiced their dissatisfaction over the proposed electoral boundaries by filing objections and taking up cases in court because the Election Commission is compromised.
It is placed under the Prime Minister’s Department and will not be able to do its work freely and independently.
In the constituency I represent, the Election Commission turned Klang to a Chinese-majority seat when it was originally a multiracial one.
Other constituencies, especially in Selangor, have been dismantled and put back into different shapes and sizes, with at least six super constituencies of more than 130,000 voters each.
So while Najib thumps his chest about a clean election, major fraud has already happened.
If the Prime Minister wants to make the next polls the cleanest one ever, he should not table the new electoral boundaries when Parliament convenes in March.
He should instead allow the next government to decide how best to redelineate all Parliamentary constituencies in Malaysia with an independent Election Commission.