PKR and Amanah today announced two of the former assemblymen whose defections triggered the collapse of the Melaka state government to contest the upcoming state polls, at an event to announce candidates for the two Pakatan Harapan (PH) parties from which the DAP leadership was conspicuously absent.
Idris Haron and Nor Azman Hassan will respectively represent PKR and Amanah in Asahan and Pantai Kundor, despite protests from DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng.
The press conference to announce the candidates, days after DAP announced its own, was attended by PH chairman and PKR president Anwar Ibrahim and his Amanah counterpart Mohamad Sabu.
Anwar said the decision to include the duo had already been an “open secret”.
He also claimed that Lim did not attend the event today as DAP had already announced its candidates.
“Guan Eng and the DAP leadership convey their regards, as they had announced a few days back in Kuala Lumpur the names of their candidates who will be representing PH,” he said.
On Nov 1, DAP’s Ramkarpal Singh had criticised Anwar’s defence of the four Melaka assemblymen whose defections triggered the collapse of the state government, saying fielding any of them as PH candidates would be mocked by voters.
The move was also criticised by PKR vice-president Rafizi Ramli, who instead accused Amanah of wanting to field the defecting assemblymen – Idris, Nor Azman, Noor Effandi Ahmad and Norhizam Hassan Baktee.