The seats of three assemblymen who had their PAS memberships terminated yesterday have been vacated, Perlis assembly speaker Rus’sele Eizan announced today.
No by-elections are necessary for the Chuping, Bintong and Guar Sanji seats since the state assembly automatically dissolves in two years.
However, Rus’sele said he will write to the Election Commission to ask for by-elections to be held as there was a “necessity”.
Saad Seman (Chuping), Anwar Ismail (Bintong) and Ridzuan Hashim (Guar Sanji) allegedly joined five Bersatu assemblymen in submitting statutory declarations to the Raja of Perlis declaring that they had withdrawn support for menteri besar Shukri Ramli.
Pakatan Harapan’s sole Perlis representative, Indera Kayangan assemblyman Gan Ay Ling, is also believed to have submitted a statutory declaration to the ruler.
The PAS trio had their party memberships terminated yesterday, with PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang saying their actions went against the Islamic party’s stance.
Perikatan Nasional held 14 of the 15 seats in the Perlis assembly, of which PAS had nine and Bersatu five, while PKR held the remaining one through Gan.
Losing the support of eight assemblymen would have meant that Shukri had lost his majority support in the Perlis state assembly.
However, the vacating of the three assemblymen’s seats throws the matter into limbo.
As it stands, Shukri would have the support of six PAS assemblymen while Bersatu’s five assemblymen would be in the opposition.
Perlis Pakatan Harapan has backed the existing PN state government to remain till the end of its term for the sake of stability, but it did not explicitly state support for Shukri.
