BN suspicious over way Bukit Selambau rep resigned
(The Star) ALOR SETAR: Kedah Barisan Nasional has questioned the manner in which PKR’s Bukit Selambau assemblyman V. Arumugam resigned.
State Barisan chairman Datuk Seri Mahdzir Khalid said the whole episode seemed “funny” as Arumugam tendered his letter through a third party and had so far not contacted Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Azizan Abdul Razak to personally inform him of his decision.
He also questioned why Arumugam cited Barisan as the cause of his resignation.
“If he had any problems, they were obviously not caused by us,” he told newsmen before holding a meeting with state MIC leaders yesterday.
Mahdzir denied allegations that Barisan had offered RM5mil to Arumugam as stated in his statutory declaration which was appended to his resignation letter.
“If we have RM5mil, it is better for us to distribute it among our component parties for our development projects. We never pressured Arumugam to join Barisan,” he said.
Mahdzir said he would leave it to the Election Commission to investigate the validity of the statutory declaration.
He said the party would now focus on preparations for the coming by-election.
“The seat is allocated to MIC, thus we will leave it to the party leaders to decide on the suitable candidate,” he said.
On whether the Barisan was confident of wresting the seat, Mahdzir said the coalition had a fighting chance despite being the underdog.
Meanwhile, State speaker Datuk Dr Abdul Isa Ismail handed over a letter to the commission to officially notify them of the Bukit Selambau seat vacancy yesterday.
Kedah Election Commission director Zainal Abidin Zakaria said the letter was faxed to its headquarters in Putrajaya after he received the letter at 5.50pm yesterday.
When asked about the statutory declaration that came with Arumugam’s resignation letter, he said he would leave it to the headquarters to check its validity.
Zainal Abidin told a press conference at his office yesterday that the commission would hold a special meeting over this matter on Friday.
“We are in the midst of preparing a voters’ list. There are a total of 35,464 voters in the area, where 50% of the voters are Malays, 30% Indians and 20% Chinese,” he said.
