PAKATAN Harapan said its highly anticipated meeting attended by Dr Mahathir Mohamad today discussed many issues at length but remained tight-lipped on details.

In a brief statement, PH said it made good progress in the three-hour meeting at the PKR headquarters in Petaling Jaya.

“Today’s meeting saw a comprehensive discussion on the views of each party, and showed very positive progress. A decision on the outcome of the meeting today will be made within a week,” it said in a joint statement by its leaders.

Talk was rife preceding the meeting that the pact had clinched the numbers needed to form the federal government and topple Perikatan Nasional.

It was also expected to announce who its candidate for prime minister would be.

Alongside Dr Mahathir, the meeting, chaired by PKR president Anwar Ibrahim, was attended by DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng, Amanah president Mohamed Sabu and Warisan president Mohd Shafie Apdal.

Dr Mahathir was formerly Bersatu and PH chairman when he was prime minister, but lost the chair after Bersatu president Muhyiddin Yassin withdrew the party from the coalition that won the 2018 general election.

The nonagenarian Langkawi MP and his son, Mukhriz, as well as other MPs aligned with him, had their Bersatu memberships removed last month for opposing Muhyiddin’s PN government.

Today’s PH presidential council meeting is the first time both Dr Mahathir and Anwar have come together in public since Perikatan removed the PH government.

It was also the first time that Dr Mahathir had set foot in the PKR headquarters in Merchant Square.

The council had been attempting to forge a clear transition plan for Dr Mahathir to hand over the prime minister’s post to Anwar prior to PH’s collapse.

Anwar was absent at a May 18 press conference Dr Mahathir and other PH leaders held after the one-day Parliament sitting, and was again absent from a meeting Amanah and DAP leaders held with Dr Mahathir last week.

Earlier, it was reported that Dr Mahathir, along with six former Bersatu members, are suing party leaders and the Registrar of Societies (RoS) over wrongful termination from the party.

In their statement of claim, the six accuse Muhyiddin and Bersatu secretary-general Hamzah Zainuddin of conspiring with the RoS to seize power in the party.

“We are disputing this wrongful, invalid and malicious act as well as the conspiracy to commit fraud and the unlawful wrest of Bersatu and its leadership by Muhyiddin,” they said in a statement. – June 9, 2020.