KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 2 — Parti Pejuang Tanah Air’s pro tem deputy president Senator Datuk Marzuki Yahya today rebutted Home Minister Datuk Seri Hamzah Zainudin’s claim that his party’s application to the Registrar of Societies (RoS) was rejected as it was not in order.
In a statement today, Marzuki however admitted that both his party and the RoS had “technical issues and misunderstanding” on both sides, during his January 8 meeting with the director-general of RoS.
He said that RoS had referred to the party’s application via its e-ROSES platform, when his party had already submitted the necessary documents needed in an orderly fashion on October 2, last year.
“Based on the face-to-face rechecking, both parties agreed and took the initiative to use the official documents which were submitted in October 20202, as RoS’ reference, to obtain an approval for this application.
“For the record, Pejuang had submitted an appeal to the home minister and the RoS during the January 8 meeting. The appeal letter was handed by hand to the director-general of RoS,” he said.
“I expect the home minister to give an answer to the appeal letter which was submitted by Pejuang, by making a clarification on the status of the appeal submitted and not repeat the same response given by RoS a day before the matter is heard in court. In my view, there is no reason as to why Pejuang’s party application cannot be approved,” Marzuki added.
In his statement earlier today, Hamzah said it was regrettable that he has been accused of blocking the applications of Pejuang and Syed Saddiq’s Syed Abdul Rahman’s Malaysian United Democratic Alliance or Muda.
Previously, Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad who leads Pejuang, alleged “political motive” behind the RoS rejection of his party’s application.
The former prime minister contrasted Pejuang’s attempt to the swift registration of the Perikatan Nasional (PN) coalition that included Hamzah’s Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia party. Hamzah is also the secretary-general of PN.
Last month, Muda sued both Hamzah and the RoS over the rejection and applied for the courts to compel the registrar to complete the party’s registration.
