Bersih co-chairperson Ambiga Sreenevasan says the government must establish another royal commission of inquiry (RCI) to probe allegations on ‘citizenship-for-votes' scheme in the peninsula, as such commissions have been proven effective in gathering evidence.

NONEWhat transpired during the public hearing of the RCI on the Sabah immigrant issue in the past few days, Ambiga said, has proven that witnesses are willing to testify before a royal commission.

"We should have a royal commission of inquiry in Peninsular Malaysia as well, because we have received many reports of the same thing happening here.

"It is very hard to get evidence because people are afraid to come forward, but if you have an RCI, they would be protected," she told Malaysiakini when contacted today.

The revelations by several former National Registration Department (NRD) officers during the RCI public hearing in Kota Kinabalu, which started on Monday, have confirmed speculation that has been rife for years that there was a clandestine operation in the 1990s to issue ICs and other documents to allow illegal immigrants in Sabah to vote in elections.

The officers claimed that they were instructed to facilitate immigrants to vote to help BN wrest and maintain power in the Borneo state since the 1990s and for Umno to take root there.

NONEFormer deputy home minister Megat Junid Megat Ayub (right), who died in 2008, and former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad's political secretary Abdul Aziz Shamsuddin, were implicated in the covert operation.

Yesterday, Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak said it was  premature to draw conclusions from the RCI hearing, which was in its initial stage.

"We cannot gauge from the testimony of some witnesses. There are 167 more witnesses that will be called," Najib told a press conference after chairing the BN supreme council meeting in Kuala Lumpur.

The Election Commission had also declined to comment on the revelations before the RCI concludes its investigation.