The Malaysian Insight

ORIGINAL copies of Tasek Gelugor’s Form 14 – the document that confirms the total number of votes received by candidates at each polling station – are now stored in the Penang High Court vault.

The 14th general election result for the parliamentary seat is being disputed by Deputy Foreign Minister Marzuki Yahya, who lost by 81 votes to incumbent Shabudin Yahaya, who recently quit Barisan Nasional.

Haniff Khatri Abdulla, who leads Marzuki’s legal team, told reporters that the Election Commission presented the copies of Form 14 to the election court this morning, as ordered.

Lawyers representing Marzuki and defendants Shabudin and the EC have been given photocopies.

“The election court last month ordered the EC to provide the copies to facilitate the proceedings.

“The EC has complied with the order, and the forms were unsealed this morning before the Penang High Court’s senior assistant registrar, Mohd Ridzwan Salleh, and all the lawyers,” he said, adding that the process took about two hours.

He said the parties in the case are under oath and cannot make public the contents of Form 14, as per Section 5 of the Election Offences Act.

“Everyone is under oath and cannot reveal the contents of the documents to the public until the proceeding continues.

“The court will meet with the parties involved on the next date for mention, which is January 14, about 11.30am.”

Haniff added that he cannot make known the number of forms given to the election court.

“We hope everyone understands how strict election procedures are.”

The date for the case to go to trial has not yet been set.

Marzuki has said the election result is suspicious due to the high number of spoilt and unreturned ballots – 689 and 297, respectively.

He said the EC denied his request for a recount on the night of the May 9 polls, leading him to file an election petition.

Last September, election court judge Hashim Hamzah ruled that the petition was “seriously flawed”, cancelling it with cost.

Making the ruling, he said the petition neither specified the issue nor followed election rules.

Marzuki appealed against the decision in November, leading the Federal Court to send the case back to the election court in Penang. – January 2, 2019.