BY DESMOND DAVIDSON
The Malaysian Insider
24 February 2015
Electoral watchdog Bersih 2.0 will proceed to make good its promise to get a court injunction to stop Sarawak’s redrawing of the state’s electoral boundaries after Election Commission (EC) chairman Tan Sri Abdul Aziz Yusof snubbed a meeting with them.
Bersih’s vice chair for the southern peninsula, Thomas Fann said he had followed Abdul Aziz for 60km from Kuching, the Sarawak capital, to the market town of Serian, hoping to meet with and persuade the EC chief.
Bersih wants the EC to stop the local inquiries on the new electoral boundaries pending the outcome of PKR’s judicial review on the constitutionality of the EC’s proposal.
Abdul Aziz and the rest of the seven-member commission were in Serian to hear the objections of voters from the state seats of Triboh and Tebedu.
Fann, who managed to have a 10-minute meeting with Sarawak EC director Datuk Takun Sangguh at the Serian community hall where the hearing took place, said he was given a “flat ‘No’” on the grounds that Bersih had no capacity or locus standi to be part of the redelineation process in Sarawak.
Bersih had on Sunday warned that the EC’s refusal to halt its inquiry sessions, which are mandated by law on any proposed boundary redrawing, may result in application of injunctions.
“We’ll file the application as soon as possible. Before the inquiries end,” Fann said.
The application would not be in Bersih’s name, but that of a local voter.
Yesterday, Takun had said the inquiries could take about two weeks to complete.
Fann said he told Takun that Bersih was objecting to the redelineation because of unequal apportioning of representatives to a legislative body, and over the EC’s unconstitutional move of having the electoral boundaries cut through administrative divisional boundaries.
“The law does not allow the EC to draw up seats in Sarawak by cutting state boundaries. It’s against Section 2A of the Thirteenth Schedule.”
While Fann said Bersih had found many instances of cross-boundary cuttings, he gave the two parliamentary seats of Tanjung Manis in Mukah division and Sarikei in the division with the same name as examples.
Fann said for the EC to increase the number of voters in Tanjung Manis from around 8,000 to over 19,000, the EC drew a boundary that had cut into the divisional boundary in neighbouring Sarikei.
He said this, too, had resulted in the second largest town in Sarikei division, Bintangor, being divided with one half in the Tanjung Manis parliamentary seat and the other in the Sarikei parliamentary seat.
The opposition has charged the EC of gerrymandering in the redrawing of the electoral boundary.
“We now have no other option, but to take the injunction,” Fann said.
Bersih yesterday attempted to pass a letter requesting an appointment to meet Abdul Aziz, who refused to accept the letter.
PKR Sarawak vice chairman See Chee How, acting on Bersih’s behalf, however, managed to hand the letter to Takun.
The group had on Sunday questioned the EC’s insistence in holding the local inquiries despite knowing that there was a judicial review pending, filed by See to have the redelineation proposal declared null and void.
See, the Batu Lintang assemblyman, and a voter in Ulu Baram named Paul Baya, applied for leave for the judicial review on February 2 and were granted the leave by the Kuching High Court on February 17.
The court is to hear the leave again on March 19 and to set a date for the hearing.
In their affidavit, the two had claimed the publication, or notification of the EC to review the delineation was not in compliance with the provisions of the 13th Schedule of the Federal Constitution, and that the EC did not have the power to make changes to parliamentary consitutuencies in the delineation exercise.
Both are seeking court orders to declare the exercise “null and void and of no effect”.
“To hastily schedule the inquiry within three weeks of the one-month objection period suggests that the EC is disrespectful of the judicial review process and cannot care less about wasting the time, energy and resources of all parties in the event of a ‘null and void’ judgement,” Bersih had said.
“To save the time, energy and resources of all parties including the court, the EC should instead consider withdrawing the first display notice and redo the process constitutionally, whereupon See may then withdraw his application,” it added. – February 24, 2015.