that was jonathan head reporting on that story for us. a little earlier, i spoke to tharma pillai, co founder of undi18, a malaysian youth movement that successfully advocated constitutional amendment to reduce the minimum voting age. here is what he had to say about the significance of the youth vote. i think it s been incredibly important because with the implementation of the lowered voter age together with automatic voter registration, you saw a massive increase in voters, 5.8 million, which increased the total percentage of electorate by 40%. in any measure, 40% increase in your voter numbers is a huge change in democracy, but even more important was that it increased the percentage of youth voters, and of course electorally in malaysia, we consider youth category from 18 40. and this bloc of voters now represent 51% of the total number of voters in malaysia, so essentially the youth vote
if he can t form a government, then we will see, probably given the age he s at, one of the giants of malaysian politics exiting the stage. tharma pillai is co founder of undi18, a malaysian youth movement that successfully advocated constitutional amendment to reduce the minimum voting age. here is what he had to say about the significance of the youth vote. i think it s been incredibly important because with the implementation of the lowered voter age together with automatic voter registration, you saw a massive increase in voters, 5.8 million, which increased the total percentage of electorate by a0%. in any measure, 40% increase in your voter numbers is a huge change in democracy, but even more important was that it increased
the voting age from 21 to 18. tharma pillai is the co founder of undi18, a malaysian youth movement that successfully advocated constitutional amendment to reduce the minimum voting age. we were just telling you about. rate to have you on the programme, tharma. in your view how important has the youth vote been in these elections? . «a has the youth vote been in these elections? . ., has the youth vote been in these elections? has the youth vote been in these elections? . ., ., elections? thanks for having me. i think it has elections? thanks for having me. i think it has been elections? thanks for having me. i think it has been incredibly - think it has been incredibly important because of the implementation of the low voter edge along with automatic voter registration, you saw 5.8 million, which increase the total electorate by 40%. which increase the total electorate by a0%. in any measure, 40% increase is a huge change in democracy but even more important was that it increase