Youth Perceptions Towards Readiness of Youth in Kuching, Malaysia: Are they ready to vote? / Muhammad Haiqal Moshidi, Nur Syifaa’ Fasihah Abdul Latif and Chai Shin Yi

Voting is a fundamental component in a democratic society. The expression of the people's will; whether they approve or oppose policies, or candidates, or political parties is essential in a nation's democratic process. Citizens are not only bound by law to vote, but it is their responsibility to fulfill this civic duty. However, youth participation in the electoral process has been lacking globally. At the same time, it needs to be pointed out that the different categorization of youth has contributed to a gap in identifying reasons behind this youth absenteeism in elections. The United Nations defines youth as the age of 15-24 years old. While a similar definition is used in the United States, the youth policy categorized youths into 3 groups: early adolescence (under 14), middle adolescence (15-17), late adolescence, and early adulthood (18- 24). Currently, the voting age in the United States is 18. Nonetheless, legislation has been proposed to lower the minimum local and national voting age to 16 years. Oosterhooff (2020) pointed out that teens in the United States can register to vote when they turn 18. Some states even allow teenagers as young as 16 to pre-register to vote, even though they cannot vote in an election until they are 18 years old (Morin, 2020). Meanwhile, in Malaysia, youth is referred to as a person between the age of 15 and 30 years old. Before the amendment made on the Youth Societies and Youth Developments Act 2007 (Act 668) in 2019, youth covered those up to the age of 40. Subsequently, the voting age was also lowered from 21 to 18. It was estimated that this move would bring an additional 7.8 million new voters to the electoral roll (Malaysian Election Commission, 2018). However, the Sarawak state government has maintained its definition of youth as those aged between 15-40 years old as indicated by the Ministry of Youth and Sports Sarawak.