THE Perikatan Nasional (PN) government will not conduct local government elections, said Zuraida Kamaruddin.

“Your suggestion is very good and it is some of the small steps that local councils will be doing to promote democracy, seeing that the PN government will not be holding local government elections,” said the housing and local government minister in Dewan Rakyat today.

“And I feel that it’s right as it’s too drastic a move for society to accept local councils to hold local elections,” said Zuraida during the question and answer session today.

Zuraida was responding to Hassan Arifin’s (Rompin-BN) suggestion for local councils to invite consumer groups, local businesses, and various organisations to observe local council meetings.

Earlier, Zuraida said not all the local councils’ meetings are open to the public as they do not have enough facilities such as the right venues or video capabilities.

She said many local councils also face financial difficulties as they have not raised their assessment rates since the 1980s.

This is in contrast to what Zuraida told Parliament on July 13.

The minister had told Parliament that local elections will cost an estimated RM2 million per council and the studies were still ongoing.

But less than a day later, Zuraida was blasted by Umno’s Noh Omar (Tg Karang-BN) about what she had said.

“I want to state here that Selangor PAS and Umno will reject any attempt at local council elections.

“Which manifesto was this (local council elections) in? Was it Pakatan Harapan’s manifesto?

“As such, I want the housing and local government minister to announce that the PN government will cancel all plans to hold local council elections,” said Selangor Umno chief during his speech in Parliament. – August 6, 2020.