PETALING JAYA, March 16 — Bersatu’s inaugural elections for top leadership posts on its supreme council as well as its Armada youth wing and Srikandi women’s wing are likely to be delayed due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

The party’s election committee chairman Tan Sri Syed Hamid Albar told a press conference today that it had initially planned for the election to take place at the division level nationwide on April 18.

"The date of the division meeting for the elections is chosen by the Supreme Council. Presently, it is fixed on April 18, so this has to be postponed. Our branches can still meet to elect their division representatives until March 29, that has been postponed too.

"Because of the letter and instructions from the Registrar of Societies (ROS), all of this has to be postponed. This includes our Annual General Assembly set to be held in June. ROS has instructed all meetings, seminars and conventions to be postponed until after June 30,” said Syed Hamid.

When asked whether or not this will lead to the party being deregistered, Syed Hamid said he believes that this should not be the case because the instructions came from ROS itself.

Touching on the fact that the postponement will give candidates a longer campaign period, the party’s elections chief pointed out that ROS has already instructed that party members should not be organising any official gatherings.

However, he said that small gatherings of less than 10 individuals should be fine and that this sort of campaigning can be done on a small scale in someone’s home.