NO BATU SAPI ELECTION PETITION

By: DATUK YONG TECK LEE

I will not be filing an election petition to challenge the results of the Batu Sapi by-election because it will take too much time and energy which I need to concentrate on the preparations for the impending general elections. An election petition will involve a lot of witnesses’ affidavits and a huge amount of court documents that will inevitably require my personal involvement.

Confidence in election petitions has been shaken in the Pensiangan parliamentary and Api Api state seats petitions in 2008. In the case of the Api Api petition, the facts were so clear. PBS party workers were caught red handed distributing illegal leaflets outside the SAPP head office (to make it seem like the leaflets were the products of SAPP).

These workers were hauled to the police station. Their evidence showed that their leaflets originated from Airport View Hotel, which was proven as the operations centre of PBS candidates. Other witnesses testified the details. But the court ruled otherwise.

The Batu Sapi election offences such as massive and blatant corruption and illegal leaflets were not likely the work of the BN-PBS candidate Datin Linda Tsen. She was hardly aware of what was happening around her. It is unjust to punish her with a grueling election petition trial. I remember the injustice caused to me in 2000 when I was punished for the fault of the Election Commission which failed to clean the electoral rolls of illegal voters.

Election petitions are too costly. I only managed to pay off the 1999 Likas election petition costs to Ansari in October 2009. If PKR candidate, Ansari choses to file an election petition, then he can do what he did in the 2008 election petition for Api Api, that is to subpoena me to give evidence.

I leave it to the authorities to investigate corruption and other election offences committed in Batu Sapi. It was impossible for the Election Commission and the police not to have seen the blatant corruption, vote buying and illegal leaflets being committed in the open.