Ex-military personnel who come forward to expose postal vote fraud are the true patriots who love army and country


The Armed Forces chief General Zulkifeli Mohd Zin has got it all wrong when he hit out against former military personnel for exposing electoral fraud in past general elections in the manipulation of postal votes as an act of betrayal and questioned their loyalty to the armed forces.

In actual fact, the ex-military personnel who come forward to expose postal vote fraud are the true patriots who love the army and the country as they want to see the army continue to be held in the highest esteem by all sectors of society and the country restored to the right track of a healthy democratic nation.

Zulkifeli’s rhetorical question “How can we be loyal to you if you are disloyal to us” is not only misplaced but is the classic example of how far the public service, of which the armed forces are part, have deviated from its proper non-partisan and professional role.

The object of loyalty of all Malaysians, whether individuals, groups or public servants including armed forces must be to the country and the Yang di Pertuan Agong and no other as it is not only wrong, but a great national disservice to indoctrinate anyone including public servants and the armed forces to be more loyal to Umno than to the country or to equate loyalty to Umno as loyalty to the country.

The four ex-servicemen, Major (Rtd) Risman Mastor, Kamarulzaman Ibrahim, Mohamed Nasir Ahmad and Mohd Kamil Omar who have come forward to admit that they had been ordered by their commanding officers to mark postal votes from hundreds and thousands of personnel who were out of the field in three separate general elections between 1978 and 1999 should be commended for their public spiritedness and great sense of patriotism instead of being castigated as “traitors”.

What the four ex-servicemen revealed has not come as a surprise to the Malaysian public as such electoral malpractices with regard to postal ballots is an open secret for decades.

These exposes of postal ballot frauds in previous general elections are not attacks on the integrity, competence and loyalty of the armed forces but patriotic efforts to remove flaws and abuses in the postal ballot system to ensure that every military personnel can freely vote for the candidate of his or her choice in elections.

What Zulkifeli should have done is take effective measures to eradicate these electoral flaws and abuses as for instance allowing candidates to send polling agents into military establishments to supervise the postal ballot voting process instead of making emotional and baseless attacks questioning the loyalty of patriotic Malaysians who want to see a free, fair and clean electoral system.

  1. #1 by DAP man on Friday, 19 August 2011 - 12:40 pm

    Nowadays every chief of an institution speaks like an UMNO minister.
    Whether it is the Armed Forces chief, EC Chairman, MACC chief, AG, CJ, State Sec etc.
    They think they work for UMNO and their loyalty is for UMNO.

  2. #2 by asia on Friday, 19 August 2011 - 12:50 pm

    You can suspect all of them whether are qualify to hold the post

    Because they were not qualify but arranged by the corrupted BN as qualify to hold the post

    these could be the reasons why they were so loyalty to them

  3. #3 by dagen on Friday, 19 August 2011 - 2:19 pm

    The army’s loyalty is to the king and country of which umno is both. King and county are both umno and umno is both king and malaysia; and more. Umno is also the GOD of all gods.

    Now you know why the head of every public institution speaks the umno language and believes in islam jenis-umno?

  4. #4 by Dipoh Bous on Friday, 19 August 2011 - 2:53 pm

    Why not we request them (the current arm force chief and the former ones) to take “sumpah laknat”?

    Lets see whether they are willing to do that or not….

  5. #5 by monsterball on Friday, 19 August 2011 - 4:16 pm

    All who revealed and confess are traitors.
    All that are smart to deny….twist and turn are patriots.
    That’s Malaysia….under Najib’s government.
    Live with it or do something.
    Live with it…you will be a slave to UMNO B.
    Do something….against all odds…you can live with it…feeling 10 feet tall….that you have done your best for country and people.
    For all those who support UMNO B…you are supporting the Devil and as such…stop fooling God.
    Be brave and say…you love the Devil more than God…and stop being hypocrites.

  6. #6 by isahbiazhar on Friday, 19 August 2011 - 5:20 pm

    More wrong doings of UMNO will come out now that the people have lost the fear of reprisal .The army and the police have many secrets to hide.In the name of justice more of these people should come out and lay to the public their wrong doings at the insistence of the government of the day.In the trial of Anwar the decline of the witnesses to be interviewed shows the fear they have under scrutiny.We should open a website for this purpose for people to come out openly but withholding their names.We may unearth and it will be good for the next election.

  7. #7 by citizenwatch on Friday, 19 August 2011 - 5:25 pm

    LKS and Pakatan, enough of engagements. This has already reaced the level of taking legal action against EC, NRD and government for obvious and proven electoral fraud. Najis and BN are merely buying time. No need to join the Elections Select committee or whatchmaycallit. The shenanigans have hit the fan.

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