GEORGETOWN - Police, alongside the State Penang Government and a few other agencies such as the Penang State Education Department and Social Welfare Department have identified alternative locations for temporary evacuation centres (PPS) if flooding were to take place during voting day.
Penang police chief Datuk Mohd Shuhaily Mohd Zain said the voting centres which have previously functioned as PPS would remain as voting centres.
"All agencies including the police are prepared if a flood occurs this Saturday. Police with the state government and a few agencies involved have identified alternative locations for the PPS.
"Any previous PPS locations that were made to voting centres will remain as voting centres. We will change the PPS to an alternative PPS that’s around the areas involved," he said at a press conference in Sri Pinang Hall after the election briefing towards Penang Contingent officers and members on Thursday.
The Malaysian Meteorological Department (MetMalaysia) predicted that storms, heavy rains and strong winds would hit a few areas around the country starting from Nov 13 to the GE15 voting day on Nov 19.
In a statement aired on Nov 12, MetMalaysia said the analysis of the weather model estimates that extreme weather is expected to mostly affect rural areas, western Peninsular, Sarawak and western Sabah, especially in the evening that lasts until night, throughout the period.
Commenting on another matter, Shuhaily said Penang Police have only received 34 reports throughout the 15th General Election (GE15) campaign compared to 301 reports received in GE14 while the total of investigation papers in GE15 had reduced to 12 investigations papers compared to 27 in GE14.
"For this election, we have only opened one police inquiry paper (KEP), while we recorded 37 KEP during the previous election.
"The number of charges recorded is four in GE15 compared to two during GE14.
The duration for GE15 was Nov 4 to Nov 16, while for GE14 it was April 28 to May 12, 2018.
He said the lesser number of reports and investigation papers opened GE15 are due to the weather and the lack of election for the State Assembly in Penang.
Shuhaily said until now a total of 1,253 applications for ceramah permits were approved by the district police chief with 456 permits being implemented.
"4,470 officers and members would be on duty for multiple tasks including traffic control and security at 331 polling stations and 2,134 channels in the state.
"I want to remind those, especially the ones supporting the parties not to make any provocations during the voting day as well as the results obtained from it. This is to ensure that untoward decisions do not take place.