THE Selangor government lost its bid to challenge the Election Commission’s (EC) redelineation exercise in court today, while a stay was imposed on the elections body from conducting any inquiry for the entire state.

Kuala Lumpur High Court judge Azizul Azmi Adnan said the courts could not intervene in a redelineation exercise, which he said was the exclusive purview of the legislature.

The court’s ruling is against the judicial review filed by the Selangor government last year which sought to quash the EC’s notice of the redelineation.

Azizul Azmi allowed the application by state government lawyer Cyrus Das that a stay be granted on the EC, until the Court of Appeal decides on the matter on constitutional grounds. 

The Selangor government is expected to file an appeal against the dismissal of its judicial review.

The EC has until September 2018 complete its redelineation exercise, the judge added.

Earlier, the judge dismissed the state government’s application to nullify the EC’s proposed redelineation exercise that would redraw the boundaries of parliamentary constituencies, which the opposition claims violates the Federal Constitution.

There are 22 Parliamentary seats in Selangor. 

Present during the decision today were Selangor MB Azmin Ali and other state Pakatan Harapan leaders. 

“This means everything is now status quo,” Azmin, who is also PKR deputy president, told reporters outside the court.

“This is a decision that is well-received because if this stay was not given, then our appeal becomes academic and would have no effect on our (legal) arguments later on,” he said. 

Selangor filed for a judicial review application in October last year, naming the EC, its chairman Hashim Abdullah and secretary Abdul Ghani Salleh as respondents. 

The federal opposition state government sought, besides nullifying the EC’s notice of the redelineation, a declaration the notice was lacking in details, leading to voters, local authorities or the state government being unable to exercise their constitutional right to file representations.

Selangor also sought a declaration the EC had violated constitutional provisions on the delimitation of election constituencies, leading to a malproportioned number of voters in seats.

Selangor also cited EC’s failure to use the latest electoral roll in its redelineation exercise and the roll it had relied on for was incomplete and inaccurate, affecting 136,272 voters in Selangor.

The state’s application to a challenge was dismissed by the High Court on the legal points the state government was not affected or adversely affected by the EC exercise. 

“However, the court recognised the EC, the respondent, has failed to come up with rebuttal evidence on some of the complaints we have raised in court, which are gerrymandering and also malapportionment,” Azmin said. 

“Because we feel very strongly on these issues and the complaints we received from different entities and the Selangor voters, we have decided we will pursue this case at the higher court and I will discuss with the legal counsel to proceed with our appeal with the Court of Appeal.”

In approving the stay application, Azizul Azmi said the challenge by the state government has “far reaching consequences that go beyond” the High Court.

He added a stay would result in a “clot” in the EC’s operating procedures, but would be a “temporary one”. – December 7, 2017.