'Opposition also involved in polls hanky-panky'

Even the opposition, said former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad, has engaged in hanky-panky during polls.

"In my time, even the opposition engaged in such tactics. At one time, there were 50 people registered in one house.

"We don't know how, but they managed to register the voters in the constituency," he told reporters after launching a disaster fund for Somalia famine relief in Putrajaya today.

Mahathir said that this matter needs to be addressed by the Election Commission and expressed his support for the proposed select committee on electoral reforms.

He admitted that elections in Malaysia are not free of irregularities and interference from the government, but stressed the defects were not as serious as elsewhere in the world.

"There may be some hanky-panky, but elections in Malaysia are clean, not absolutely clean, but clean.

"I must stress that it is also not as rampant as in other countries where the government gets 90 percent of the vote... here the opposition has even won some states," he explained.

Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak disclosed plans to set up the committee on Tuesday, immediately garnering both brickbats and accolades from various quarters.

While many have applauded Najib, some said he had no choice as popular sentiment was for it. Yet others criticised the move as not going far enough or described it as a diversionary tactic to temporarily stifle dissent.

International pressure

Asked if Najib's announcement can be seen as caving in to the largely negative international reaction to the government's outlawing of, and subsequent crackdown, on the Bersih 2.0 rally, he said that the pressure also emanated domestically.

"Not international backlash, it is the local backlash on him," Mahathir posited.

The former premier himself had spoken out against the July 9 rally, calling it an attempt by the opposition to attack the administration, rather than a real effort to cleanse the process of elections.

His daughter Marina has publicly disagreed with him on this and had marched in the recent rally - the second after the first 2007 gathering in Kuala Lumpur.

While the opposition and civil society have long been campaigning for electoral reforms in Malaysia, the government has maintained that there are no serious problems with the way elections are conducted.

However it has not allowed local and international observers during the polls.