PKR Lunas rep Radzhi quits

KUALA LUMPUR: Lunas state assemblyman Mohd Radzhi Salleh (pic) has announced he had quit Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) to become an independent member of the Kedah legislative assembly.

Radzhi, who is chairman of the Tourism, Community Development and Human Resources Committee, said he would retain the post of state executive councillor as the appointment was made by the Sultan of Kedah.

His decision to leave PKR was due to loss of confidence in the PKR leadership and in keeping with the dissolution of the PKR Padang Serai division announced by division acting chief Jamaludin Abu Hassan who himself had quit the party, he told a news conference also attended by Jamaludin.

“As an elected representative, I sympathise with the decision to dissolve the division because the division members were responsible for my victory in the last general election,” he said.

In the general election last year, Radzhi beat the BN candidate S. Ananthan by a majority of 10,323 votes.

Radzhi said 14 division committee members and 200 ordinary members supported the dissolution of the division.

Radzhi said he would continue to serve as an independent state assemblyman and support the federal government led by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak.

Replying to a question, Radzhi denied that he has been bought over by any political party.

Soon after PKR started making allegations against Radzhi saying that he had financial and personal problems.

On June 4, Radzhi, in his 50s, said that he had been probed by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission in June for allegedly making working claims amounting to RM148,000 for the period of 12 months from March last year.

However, he claimed the commission had cleared his name.

The state PKR leadership is also citing a personal problem involving a woman as a reason for his decision. However this cannot be confirmed.

With Radzhi quitting PKR, the Kedah assembly now has four PKR assemblymen, two of whom are also state executive councillors. PAS has 16 assemblymen in the House, seven of whom are state executive councillors, while the DAP has one assemblyman. The Barisan Nasional has 14 assemblymen.

In PADANG SERAI, former Padang Serai PKR chief Hamid Osman, 68, said he had expected the division to dissolve.

Hamid, who had headed the division since 2004 and quit the party in April, said he and more than 500 others were considering joining Umno.

Another former leader of Padang Serai PKR, Sarji Singh, 45, said he was not surprised over the departure of Radzhi from PKR as he himself and more than 1,000 PKR members had left the party to join the MIC last year.

Padang Serai Umno deputy chief Abdul Halim Hasan said Umno was prepared to accept former PKR members for the sake of Malay unity and development.

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