“I think the polling date is designed to lower the turnout (of voters) to benefit BN.

“They want to prevent people from voting on the 1MDB (issue) and ringing the death knell on the GST (goods and services tax),” Lim said when contacted.

At its meeting today, the EC set May 9, a Wednesday, as the polling day for GE14 with early voting on May 5.

Nomination day is fixed on Saturday, April 28 and the campaign period is from April 28 to May 8.

EC chairman Mohd Hashim Abdullah said there were 14,940,624 registered voters. Of the total, 13,255 are early voters and 3,653 are overseas voters.

Lim said the May 9 polling date would make it “virtually impossible” for those working out of town to return home to vote.

He said even if polling day was declared a public holiday, there would be no time for voters to travel to their respective hometowns.

In addition, he said, he could not declare a public holiday for Penang since he, like the government heads in all states except Sarawak, are in caretaker mode.

“We are disappointed by the decision to hold polling during mid-week. We feel polling day should be on a weekend, otherwise how do you get people to come out to vote?

“We can only urge our supporters to take leave to come back home to vote, because they (the ruling government) want to prevent change.”

Lim said those most affected would be the voters working in neighbouring Singapore and other foreign countries.

“Unless they take leave to return, but really, how do we take leave like this? Isn’t it a bit too late?

“For the time being, May 9 should be declared a public holiday. It is just too important.”

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