{"id":569,"date":"2018-09-14T08:00:59","date_gmt":"2018-09-14T00:00:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/?p=569"},"modified":"2018-09-14T08:00:59","modified_gmt":"2018-09-14T00:00:59","slug":"concern-over-pkr-polls-port-dickson-by-election-clash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/?p=569","title":{"rendered":"Concern over PKR polls, Port Dickson by-election clash"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sept 14 \u2014\u00a0 As PKR faces some internal strife over the hastening of its president Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s likely return to the Dewan Rakyat through a by-election in Port Dickson, there has been calls for the party polls to be postponed.<\/p>\n

Bernama reported that PKR vice-president Shamsul Iskandar Mohd Akin had called for the party elections to be postponed until the Port Dickson parliamentary by-election was over.<\/p>\n

He said the move was to ensure accountability besides ensuring that the party machinery and all those involved were present at the constituency during the run-up to the by-election.<\/p>\n

Date set for PKR national congress<\/b><\/h4>\n

However, the party\u2019s central election committee chairman Rashid Din has promptly responded, saying that any postponement would go against the Registrar of Societies (RoS).<\/p>\n

The RoS had already fixed November 16 and 17 as the dates for the party\u2019s national congress.<\/p>\n

\u201cHence, before the congress takes place, leaders should be voted at the party election to be held at the state-level from Sept 22 to Oct 28. We cannot delay the election dates because we had already done so before,\u201d he told Bernama today.<\/p>\n

Rashid added that the election process in every party division was running smoothly so far.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have held an election-briefing session on the party\u2019s e-ballot system. Members now understand the e-ballot system which they will use for the first time in the coming party elections,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The biggest contest in the PKR polls will see incumbent Azmin Ali being challenged for the post of deputy president by party vice-president Rafizi Ramli.<\/p>\n

The contest is said to represent a wider split in the party with leaders close to Anwar leaning towards Rafizi while stalwarts in the party’s struggle since its Reformasi days mostly backing Azmin.<\/p>\n

PKR nepotism under scrutiny<\/b><\/h4>\n

Meanwhile, Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail dismissed accusations that PKR was rife with nepotism.<\/p>\n

\"PKR
Deputy Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Wan Azizah<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Should her husband, Anwar, win the Port Dickson by-election, there would be three members of the same family representing the party in the Dewan Rakyat, with Wan Azizah being the Pandan MP and Nurul Izzah the Permatang Pauh MP.<\/p>\n

She said it was a non-issue.<\/p>\n

\u201cIs there a problem? Because I thought we were voted by the rakyat,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

She also rebuffed claims that Anwar was being impatient, telling reporters he had been in jail for a total of 11 years in the past 19 years.<\/p>\n

Anwar will be standing for the Port Dickson seat in a much-anticipated by-election that should see him return to the Dewan Rakyat for the first time since 2015 when he lost his Permatang Pauh seat over the Sodomy II conviction in 2015.<\/p>\n

-NMT<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sept 14 \u2014\u00a0 As PKR faces some internal strife over the hastening of its president…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":571,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[57,49,1133,1069],"class_list":["post-569","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-anwar-ibrahim","tag-pkr","tag-port-dickson","tag-wan-azizah"],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Deputy-Prime-Minister-Datuk-Seri-Wan-Azizah.jpeg",800,532,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Deputy-Prime-Minister-Datuk-Seri-Wan-Azizah-150x150.jpeg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Deputy-Prime-Minister-Datuk-Seri-Wan-Azizah-300x200.jpeg",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Deputy-Prime-Minister-Datuk-Seri-Wan-Azizah-768x511.jpeg",640,426,true],"large":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Deputy-Prime-Minister-Datuk-Seri-Wan-Azizah.jpeg",640,426,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Deputy-Prime-Minister-Datuk-Seri-Wan-Azizah.jpeg",800,532,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Deputy-Prime-Minister-Datuk-Seri-Wan-Azizah.jpeg",800,532,false],"newsium-slider-full":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Deputy-Prime-Minister-Datuk-Seri-Wan-Azizah.jpeg",800,532,false],"newsium-featured":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Deputy-Prime-Minister-Datuk-Seri-Wan-Azizah.jpeg",800,532,false],"newsium-medium":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Deputy-Prime-Minister-Datuk-Seri-Wan-Azizah.jpeg",714,475,false]},"author_info":{"info":["Editor"]},"category_info":"Politics<\/a>","tag_info":"Politics","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/569","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=569"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/569\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":573,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/569\/revisions\/573"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/571"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=569"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=569"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=569"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}