Nomination process for PD by-election gets underway

PORT DICKSON (Bernama): The nomination process for the Port Dickson by-election gets underway at 9am Saturday (Sept 29) with all Malaysians eagerly waiting to know how many candidates will be contesting.

The Election Commission has allocated an hour for the candidates to submit their papers at Dewan Majlis Perbandaran Port Dickson.

The nomination forms must be filled accurately and submitted by the candidate to the Returning Officer. He or she must be accompanied by his or her proposer and seconder.

The nomination process ends at 10am.

After due diligence, the RO will officially announce the candidates qualified to contest in the by-election.

A number of individuals have already stated their intention to contest in the by-election which was forced by the resignation of its incumbent Datuk Danyal Balagopal Abdullah on Sept 12.

Danyal Balagopal, 68, from PKR, vacated the seat to pave the way for PKR president-elect Datuk Seri Dr Anwar Ibrahim to make a comeback to Parliament.

Although Anwar is seen as a shoo-in based on the results of previous elections which favoured PKR, two parties, PAS and Parti Rakyat Malaysia, and several individuals intend to give him a run for his money.

PAS has picked Royal Malaysian Air Force veteran Lt Col ( Rtd) Mohd Nazari Mokhtar as its candidate.

Former Umno warlord Tan Sri Mohd Isa Abdul Samad, who is also a former Negri Sembilan menteri besar, has announced that he will be standing as an independent. He quit Umno on Tuesday.

So too has social media personality Stevie Chan Keng Leong, who has even come up with a manifesto.

The Barisan Nasional has decided to boycott the by-election on the grounds that the seat was vacated just to fulfil the political ambitions of Anwar.

Polling is on Oct 13. Early voting is on Oct 9 .

In the 14th General Election on May 9 this year, Danyal Balagopal won the seat by a majority of 17,710 votes. He defeated Barisan candidate Datuk V.S. Mogan and Mahfuz Roslan of PAS. - Bernama